7j    "■'    ''  „i     *■       '      'r      .'■ 


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MORAL  PHILOSOPHY 


■\   I 


.BY  JOSEPH   RICKABY,  S.J. 


fornia 
nal 

ty 


-£c/^   '  ^> 


STONYHURST    PHILOSOPHICAL     SERIES 


ROEHAMPTON : 
PRINTED    BY    lOHN   GRIFFIN. 


STONYHURST    PHILOSOPHICAL    SERIES 


MORAL    PHILOSOPHY 


ETHICS,    DEONTOLOGY   AND    NATURAL   LAW. 


BY 

JOSEPH    RICKABY,    SJ., 

M.A.    LOND.  ;     B.SC.    OXON. 


FdVliTH    EDIT  1 01:. 

(new    IMPSpSSjOS')   * 


LONGiMANS,     GREEN,     AND     CO. 

39,    PATERNOSTER   ROW,    LONDON 

FOURTH  AVEXUK  &  30TH  STREET,  NEW  YORK 

BOMB.W,    CALCUTT.A,    AND    MADRAS 

I9I9 


mibil  ©bstat: 

JOSEPHUS   KEATING.   S.J. 

Censor  deputatus 


5mprimi  ipotcst: 

JOANNES  H.  WRIGHT,   S.J. 

Prap.  Prov.  A?iglics 


mibil  ©bstat: 

C.    SCHUT, 

D,D. 

Censor  depittatus 

5mpiimatur : 

EDM. 

CAN. 

SURMONT 

.  ■•-< 

Vic.  Geii., 

,W'5stTnGnc^steHi,tdJ^'22  Jci-i,  1918 


c  ,  c      ,  ■-     <.      c 


«       I      »^  c  t 


■ST 


I 


PREFACE    (1905). 


-   For  fifteen  years  this  Manual  has  enjoyed  all  the 
popularity  that  its  author  could  desire.     With  that 
popularity  the  author  is  the  last  person  to  wish  to 
interfere.     Therefore,  not  to  throw  previous  copies 
J  out  of  use,  this  edition  makes  no  alteration  either  in 
^  the  pagination  or  the  text  already  printed.     At  the 
(f  same  time  the  author  might  well  be  argued  to  have 
lapsed  into  strange  supineness  and   indifference  to 
moral    science,    if    in   fifteen   years   he   had    learnt 
^  nothing  new,  and  found  nothing  in  his  work  which 
fp  he   wished   to   improve.     Whoever   will   be   at  the 
expense  of  purchasing  my  Political  and  Moral  Essays 
(Benziger,  1902,  6s.)  will  find  in  the  first  essay  on 
the  Origin  and  Extent  of  Civil  Authority  an  advan- 
tageous substitute  for  the  chapter  on  the  State  in 
this  work.     The  essay  is  a  dissertation  written  for 
the  degree  of  B.  Sc.  in  the   University  of  Oxford  ; 
and    represents,    I    hope,    tolerably   well   the    best 
contemporary  teaching  on  the  subject. 

If  the  present  work  had  to  be  rewritten,  I  should 
make  a  triple  division  of  Moral  Philosophy,  into 
Ethics,  Deontology  (the  science  of  to  Beov,  i.e.,  of 


vi  PREFACE. 


what  ought  to  be  done),  and  Natural  Law.  For  if 
*'the  principal  business  of  Ethics  is  to  determine 
what  moral  obligation  is"  (p.  2),  then  the  classical 
work  on  the  subject,  the  Nicoviachean  Ethics  of 
Aristotle,  is  as  the  play  of  Hamlet  with  the  character 
of  Hamlet  left  out :  for  in  that  work  there  is  no 
analysis  of  moral  obligation,  no  attempt  to  "fix  the 
comprehension  of  the  idea  I  ought "  (ib.).  The 
system  there  exposed  is  a  system  of  Eudaemonism, 
not  of  Deontology.  It  is  not  a  treatise  on  Duty, 
but  on  Happiness :  it  tells  us  what  Happiness,  or 
rational  well-being,  is,  and  what  conduct  is  condu- 
cive to  rational  well-being.  It  may  be  found 
convenient  to  follow  Aristotle,  and  avow  that  the 
business  of  Ethics  is  not  Duty,  not  Obligation,  not 
Law,  not  Sanction,  but  Happiness.  That  fiery  little 
word  ought  goes  unexplained  in  Ethics,  except  in  an 
hypothetical  sense,  that  a  man  ought  to  do  this,  and 
avoid  that,  if  he  means  to  be  a  happy  man; 
of.  p.  115.  Any  man  who  declares  that  he  does  not 
care  about  ethical  or  rational  happiness,  stands  to 
Ethics  as  that  man  stands  to  Music  who  "  hath  no 
ear  for  concord  of  sweet  sounds." 

All  that  Ethics  or  Music  can  do  for  such  a 
Philistine  is  to  "send  him  away  to  another  city, 
pouring  ointment  on  his  head,  and  crowning  him 
with  wool,"  as  Plato  would  dismiss  the  tragedian 


PREFACE.  vli 


(Republic  III.  398).  The  author  of  the  Magna 
Moralia  well  says  (I.  i.  13)  :  "  No  science  or  faculty 
ever  argues  the  goodness  of  the  end  which  it  pro- 
poses to  itself:  it  belongs  to  some  other  faculty 
to  consider  that.  Neither  the  physician  says  that 
health  is  a  good  thing,  nor  the  builder  that  a  house 
is  a  good  thing  :  but  the  one  announces  that  he 
produces  health  and  how  he  produces  it,  and  the 
builder  in  like  manner  a  house."  The  professor  of 
Ethics  indeed,  from  the  very  nature  of  his  subject- 
matter,  says  in  pointing  out  happiness  that  it  is 
the  rational  sovereign  good  of  man  :  but  to  any 
one  unmoved  by  that  demonstration  Ethics  can 
have  no  more  to  say.  Ethics  will  not  threaten, 
nor  talk  of  duty,  law,  or  punishment. 

Ethics,  thus  strictly  considered  on  an  Aristo- 
telian basis,  are  antecedent  to  Natural  Theology. 
They  belong  rather  to  Natural  Anthropology :  they 
are  a  study  of  human  nature.  But  as  human  nature 
points  to  God,  so  Ethics  are  not  wholly  irrespective 
of  God,  considering  Him  as  the  object  of  human 
happiness  and  worship, — the  Supreme  Being  without 
whom  all  the  aspirations  of  humanity  are  at  fault 
(pp.  13 — 26,  191 — 197).  Ethics  do  not  refer  to  the 
commandments  of  God,  for  this  simple  reason,  that 
they  have  nothing  to  say  to  commandments,  or 
laws,  or  obligation,  or  authority.     They  are  simply 


viii  PREFACE. 


a  system  of  moral  hygiene,  which  a  man  may  adopt 
or  not  :  only,  like  any  other  physician,  the  professor 
of  Ethics  utters  a  friendly  warning  that  misery  must 
ensue  upon  the  neglect  of  what  makes  for  health. 

Deontology,  not  Ethics,  expounds  and  vindicates 
the  idea,  I  ought.  It  is  the  science  of  Duty.  It 
carries  the  mild  suasions  of  Ethics  into  laws,  and 
out  of  moral  prudence  it  creates  conscience.  And 
whereas  Ethics  do  not  deal  with  sin,  except  under 
the  aspect  of  what  is  called  'philosophical  sin' 
(p.  119,  §  6),  Deontology  defines  sin  in  its  proper 
theological  sense,  as  "  an  of'ence  against  God,  or 
any  thought,  word,  or  deed  against  the  law  of  God." 
Deontology  therefore  presupposes  and  is  consequent 
upon  Natural  Theology  At  the  same  time,  while 
Ethics  indicate  a  valuable  proof  of  the  existence  of 
God  as  the  requisite  Object  of  Happiness,  Deon- 
tology affords  a  proof  of  Ilim  as  the  requisite  Law- 
giver. Without  God,  mar's  rational  desire  is 
frustrate,  and  man's  conscience  a  misrepresentation 
of  fact.i 

1  This  is  Cardinal  Newman's  proof  of   the  existence  of   God 
from  Conscience:    see   pp.  124,  125,  and  Grammar  of  Assent,  pp.  104 

iii_  ed.  1895.     With  Newman's,  "  Conscience  has  both  a  critical 

and  a  judicial  office,"  corapare  Plato,  Politicus,  260  B,  a-u/jLirda-vs  r^s 
yvaiffTiKTis  Th  fjLev  iirnaKTiKhv  fi^tpos,  rb  5«  KpnmSv.  The  'critical' 
office  belongs  to  Ethics:  the  'judicial,'  or  'preceptive'  office 
rh  (TmsiKTiKov)  to  Deontology ;  and  this  latter  poiuts  to  a  Person 
who  commands  and  judges,  that  is,  to  God. 


PREFACE.  \% 


In  this  volume,  pp.  i — io8  mnke  up  the  treatise 
on  Ethics:  pp.  109 — 176  that  on  Deontology. 

Aristotle  writes :  "  He  that  acts  by  intelligence 
and  cultivates  understanding,  is  likely  to  be  best 
disposed  and  dearest  to  God.  For  if,  as  is  thought, 
there  is  any  care  of  human  things  on  the  part  of 
the  heavenly  powers,  we  may  reasonably  expect 
them  to  delight  in  that  which  is  best  and  most  akin 
to  themselves,  that  is,  in  intelligence,  and  to  make 
a  return  of  good  to  such  as  supremely  love  and 
honour  intelligence,  as  cultivating  the  thing  dearest 
to  Heaven,  and  so  behaving  rightly  and  well.  Such, 
plain-ly,  is  the  behaviour  of  the  wise.  The  wise 
man  therefore  is  the  dearest  to  God  "  (Nic.  Eth.  X. 
ix.  13).  But  Aristotle  does  not  work  out  the  con- 
nexion betv.'een  God  and  His  law  on  the  one  hand 
and  human  conscience  and  duty  on  the  other.  In 
that  direction  the  Stoics,  and  after  them  the  Roman 
Jurists,  went  further  than  Arisictle.  By  reason  of 
this  deficiency,  Aristotle,  peerless  as  he  is  in  Ethics, 
remains  an  imperfect  Moral  Philosopher. 


PREFACE  TO  THE  FOURTH  EDITION  (1918). 


I.   I  HAVE  altered  the  opening  pages  in  accordance 
with  the  Preface  to  the  edition  of  1905. 

2.  I  have  added  a  paragraph  on  SyndicaHsm 
(pp.  291-2). 

3.  Also  a  new  Table  of  Addenda  et  Corrigenda, 
and  a  new  Index. 

The  quotations  from  St.  Thomas  may  be  read 
in  English,  nearly  all  of  them,  in  the  Author's 
Aquinas  Ethicns,  2  vols.j    12s.  (Burns  and  Gates.) 


CONTENTS. 


PART   I.— ETHICS. 

Chapter    I. — Of    the    Object-matter    and   Partition    of 
Moral  Philosophy     ,  .  ,  . 

Chapter  II. — Of  Happiness. 

Section   I. — Of  Ends  .  .  . 

„       II. — Definition  of  Happiness 
,,     III. — Happiness  open  to  Man 
„      IV. — Of  the  Object  of  Perfect  Happiness 
„       V. — Of  the  use  of  the  present  life   . 
Chapter  III. — Of  Human  Acts. 

Section   I. — What  makes  a  human  act  less  voluntary 


V 


II. — Of  the  determinants  of  Morality  in  any  given 
action  .  ,  . 

Chapter  IV. — Of  Passions. 

Section   I. — Of  Passions  in  general .  , 

,,       II. — Of  Desire  .  .  . 

„     III.— Of  Delight 
„      IV.— Of  Anger 
Chapter  V. — Of  Habits  and  Virtues. 

Section   I. — Of  Habit  .  .  , 

,,       II. — Of  Virtues  in  general   . 
„     III. — Of  the  difference  between  Virtues,  Intellec 

tual  and  Moral 
„      IV. — Of  the  Mean  in  Moral  Virtue  . 
„        V. — Of  Cardinal  Virtues  . 

„      VI.— Of  Prudence      . 
„    VII. — Of  Temperance  .  , 

„  VIII.— Of  Fortitude      , 
H      IX —Of  Justice  .  ,.  , 


3 
6 

13 

21 

26 
27 

31 

41 

49 
54 
61 

64 

69 

73 

77 
84 

87 
90 

94 

loa 


Xll 


CONTENTS. 


PAGE 


PART  II.— DEONTOLOGY. 

Chapter  I.  (VI.) — Of  the  Origin  of  Moral  Obligation. 
Section  I. — Of  the  natural  difference  between  Good  and 
Evil  ..... 

,,       II. — ^How  Good  becomes  bounden  duty,  and  Evil 
is  advanced  to  sin  .... 
Chapter  II.  (VII.)— Of  the  Eternal  Law 
Chapter  III.  (VIII.) — Of  the  Natural  Law  of  Conscience. 
Section  I. — Of  the  Origin  of  Primary  Moral  Judgments 
,,      II. — Of  the  invariability  of  Primary  Moral  Judg- 
ments ..... 
,,    III. — Of  the   immutability  of  the   Natural  Law 
,,     IV.— Of  Probabilism  .... 
Chapter  IV.  (IX.)— Of  the  Sanction  of  the  Natural 

Law. 
Section  I. — Of  a  twofold  Sanction,  Natural  and  Divine 
II. — Of  the  Finality  of  the  aforesaid  Sanction     . 
,,     III. — Of  Punishment,  Retrospective  and  Retribu- 
tive ..... 
Chapter  V.  (X.) — Of  Utilitarianism 


109 

115 
126 

133 

144 

147 
152 


159 
164 

168 
177 


PART   III.— NATURAL   LAW. 

Chapter  I. — Of  Duties  to  God. 

Section  I.— Of  the  Worship  of  God 

,,      II. — Of  Superstitious  Practices    . 
,,     III. — Of  the  duty  of  knowing  God 
Chapter  II. — Of  the  Duty  of  Preserving  Life. 
Section  I. — Of  Killing,  Direct  and  Indirect 

II. — Of  Killing  done  indirectly  in  Self-defence 
„     III.— Of  Suicide        .... 
,,     IV.— Of  Duelling     .... 
Chapter  III. — Of  Speaking  the  Truth. 
Section  I. — Of  the  definition  of  a  Lie 
,,       II.— Of  the  Evil  of  Lying  . 
,,    III. — Of  the  keeping  of  Secrets  without  Lying 
Chapter  IV. — Of  Charity     .... 


191 

198 

2GO 

202 
208 
213 
219 

224 
226 
232 

?37 


CONTENTS. 


Xlll 


Chapter  V. — Of  Rights. 

Section   I. — Of  the  definition  and  division  of  Rights 
„       II.— Of  the  so-called  Rights  of  Animals    . 
„     III. — Of  the  right  to  Honour  and  Reputation 
„      IV. — Of  Contracts  .... 
v.— Of  Usury 
Chapter  VI. — Of  Makkiagp,. 

Section    I. — Of  the  Institution  of  Marriage 

,,       II. — Of  the  Unity  of  Marriage       .  . 

,,     III — Of  the  Indissolubility  of  Marriage    . 
Chapter  VII. — Ok  rKOPEUTY. 

Section    I. — Of  Private  Property   .  . 

II.— Of  Private  Capital      . 
,,     III. — Of  Landed  Property  .  .  . 

Chapter  VIII. — Of  the  State. 

S-ction    I. — Of  the  Monstrosities  called  Leviatha.i  and 
Social  Contract        .  .  .  . 

„  II. — Of  the  theory  that  Civil  Power  is  an  a:.;gre- 
gate  formed  by  subscription  of  the  powers 
of  individuals  .  .  .  . 

„     III. — Of  the  true  state  of  Nature,  which  is  the 
state  of  civil  society,  and  consequently  of 
the  Divine  origin  cf  Power 
„      IV. — Of  the  variety  of  Polities 
„        V. — Of  the  Divine  Right  of  Kings  and  the  In 

alienable  Sovereignty  of  the  People 
„      VI. — Of  the  Elementary  and  Original  Polity 
VII. — Of  Resistance  to  Civil  F'ower 
VIII.— Of  the  Right  of  the  Sword     . 
IX.— Of  War  .... 

X. — Of  the  Scope  and  Aim  of  Civil  Governmec 
„      XI. — Of  Law  and  Liberty  . 
»    XII. — Of  Liberty  of  Opinion 


•t 
>• 


PAGB 

248 
251 

2O3 
270 

273 
282 
292 


297 


307 


310 

3'9 

326 
334 
338 
343 
350 
354 
359 


ADDENDA   ET   CORRIGENDA. 

p.  31.  Aristotle  calls  the  end  rh  re'Aos  ;  the  means,  to  trphs  rh 
reXos  (St.  Thomas,  ea  qua  sunt  ad  finem) ;  the  circumstances,  to  iv 

oiS  T]    TTpa^lS. 

Observe,  both  end  and  means  are  willed  directly,  but  the  circum- 
stances indirectly. 

The  end  is  intended,  ^ovX-nrSv  ;  the  means  are  chosen,  ■npooipir6v; 
the  circumstances  are  sim'ply  permitted,  aveKTov,  rightly  or  wrongly. 
The  intention  of  the  end  is  called  by  English  philosophers  the 
motive;  while  the  choice  of  means  they  call  the  intention,  an  un- 
fortunate terminology. 

p.  42,  §.3,  "  As  the  wax  takes  all  shapes,  and  yet  is  wax  still  at 
the  bottom  ;  the  inroKfl/xeyov  still  is  wax  ;  so  the  soul  transported  in 
so  many  several  passions  of  joy,  fear,  hope,  sorrow,  anger,  and 
the  rest,  has  for  its  general  groundwork  of  all  this,  Love."  (Henry 
More,  quoted  in  Carey's  Dante,  PurgatCrio,  c.  xviii.)  Hence,  says 
Carey,  Love  does  not  figure  in  Collins's  Ode  on  the  Passions. 

p.  43.     For  daring  read  recklessness. 

p.  44.  Plato  is  a  thorough  Stoic  when  he  says  (Phaedo  83)  that 
every  pleasure  and  pain  comes  with  a  nail  to  pin  down  the  soul  to 
the  body  and  make  it  corporeal.  His  Stoicism  appears  in  his 
denunciation  of  the  drama  {Republic,  x.  604). 

p.  47,  §.  8.  The  first  chapter  of  Mill's  Autobiography,  pp.  48 — 53. 
133—149,  supplies  an  instance. 

p.  49,  §.  I,  1.  2,  ioT physical  Tea.d psychical. 

p.  52,  §.  5.  This  serving,  in  Greek  SovXeveip,  St.  Ignatius  calls 
■  inordinate  attachment,'  the  modern  form  of  idolatry.  Cf.  Romans 
vi.  16 — 22. 

p.  79.     For  spoiled  read  spoilt. 

p.  84,  foot.     For  u<ays  read  v^ay. 

p.  85,  1.  6  from  foot.  Substitute  :  ()3)  to  restrain  the  said  appetite 
in  its  irascible  part  from  shrinking  from  danger. 

p.  94,  middle.     For  others  read  other. 

p.  95.     For  Daring  read  Recklessness. 


ADDENDA   ET   CORRIGENDA.  xv 

p.  103,  middle.  Substitute,  "  neither  evening  star  nor  morning  star 
is  so  wonderful," 

p.  106,  §.  6,  Aristotle  speaks  of  'corrective'  not  of  'commutative' 
justice.  On  the  Aristotelian  division  of  justice  see  Political  and  Moral 
Essays  (P.  M.  E),  pp.  2S5-6. 

p.  Ill,  §.  4.  The  static  equivalent  of  the  dynamic  idea  of  orderly 
development  is  that  the  eternal  harmonies  and  fitnesses  of  things,  by  obser- 
vance or  neglict  whereof  a  man  comes  to  be  in  or  out  of  harmony  with 
himself,  with  his  fellows,  with  God. 

p.  133.     To  the  Readings  add  Plato.  Laws,  ix.  875,  A,  B,  C,  D. 

p.  151.  Rewrite  the  Note  thus:  The  author  has  seen  reason  some- 
what to  modify  this  view,  as  appears  by  the  Appendix.  See  P.M.E. 
pp.  185-9  :  Folder's  Progressive  Morality,  or  Fowler  and  Wilson's 
Principles  of  Morals,  pp.  227 — 248. 

p.  181,  1.  II  from  top.  Add,  This  is  "the  law  of  our  nature,  that 
function  is  primary,  and  pleasure  only  attendant  "  {Stewart,  Notes  on 
Nicomathean  Ethics,  II.  418). 

p.  218,  lines  13 — 16  from  top,  cancel  the  sentence,  To  this  query, 
etc.,  and  substitute  :  The  reply  is,  that  God  is  never  willing  that  man 
should  do  an  inordinate  act :  but  suicide  is  an  inordinate  act,  as  has  been 
shown;   capital  punishment  is  not  (c.  viii.  s.  viii.  n.  7,  p.  349). 

p.  237.     For  The  Month  for  March,  1883,   read  P.M.E.,  pp.  215 

—233- 

p.  251.     To  the  Reading  add  P.M.E-.,  pp.  267 — 2S3. 

p.  297,  1.  6  from  foot.  After  simply  evil  add  :  Hobbes  allows  that 
human  reason  lays  down  certain  good  rules,  '  laws  of  nature,'  which 
however  it  cannot  get  kept.  For  Hobbes  and  Rousseau  see  further 
P.M.E.,  pp.  81—90. 

p.  319,  middle.  Cancel  the  words  :  but  the  sum  total  of  civil  power 
is  a  constant  quantity,  the  same/or  all  Sta/es. 

pp.  322-3.  Cancel  §.  7  for  reasons  alleged  in  P.M.E.,  pp.  50 — 
72,  Substitute  :  States  are  living  organizations  and  grow,  and  their 
powers  vary  with  the  stage  of  their  development. 

P-  3231  §  8.  For  This  seems  at  variance  'with,  read  This  brings  us  to 
consider. 

p.  338.     To  the  Readings  add  P.M.E.,  pp.  102 — 113. 

p.  347,  middle.  Cancel  from  one  of  these  prerogatives  to  the  end 
of  the  sentence.  Substitute  :  of  every  polity  even  in  the  most  infan- 
tine condition. 


MORAL    PHILOSOPHY. 


Part  I.   Ethics. 


CHAPTER  I. 

OF    THE  OBJECT-MATTER     AND    PARTITION    OF    MORAL 

PHILOSOPHY. 

I.  Moral  Philosophy  is  the  science  of  human  acts 
in  their  bearing  on  human  happiness  and  human 
duty. 

2.  Those  acts  alone  are  properly  called  human, 
which  a  man  is  master  of  to  do  or  not  to  do. 
A  human  act,  then,  is  an  act  voluntary  and  free.  A 
man  is  \vhat  his  human  acts  make  him, 

3.  A  voluntary  act  is  an  act  that  proceeds  from 
the  will  with  a  knowledge  of  the  end  to  which  the 
act  tends. 

4.  A  free  act  is  an  act  which  so  proceeds  from 
the  will  that  under  the  same  antecedent  conditions 
it  might  have  not  proceeded. 

An  act  may  be  more  or  less  voluntary,  and  more 
or  less  free. 

5.  Moral  Philosophy  is  divided  into  Ethics, 
Deontology,    and    Natural   Law.       Ethics    consider 

B 


MORAL   PHILOSOPHY. 


human  acts  in  their  bearing  on  human  happiness  ; 
or,  what  is  the  same  thing,  in  their  agreement  or 
disagreement  with  man's  rational  nature,  and  their 
making  for  or  against  his  last  end.  Deontology  is 
the  study  of  moral  obligation,  or  the  fixing  of  what 
logicians  call  the  comprehension  of  the  idea  /  ought. 
Ethics  deal  with  to  Trpeirov,  '  the  becoming ' ;  De- 
ontology with  TO  Seov,  'the  obligatory'.  Deont- 
ology is  the  science  of  Duty,  as  such.  Natural 
Law  (antecedent  to  Positive  Law,  whether  divine 
or  human,  civil  or  ecclesiastical,  national  or  inter- 
national) determines  duties  in  detail, — the  extension 
of  the  idea  /  ought, — and  thus  is  the  foundation  of 
Casuistry. 

6.  In  the  order  of  sciences,  Ethics  are  ante- 
cedent to  Natural  Theology ;  Deontology,  conse- 
quent upon  it. 

Readings. — St.  Thos.,  in  Eih.,  L,  lect.  i,  init. ; 
ib.,  la  2£e,  q.  i,  art.  r,  in  corp.  ;  ib.,  q.  58,  art.  i, 
in  Corp. 


CHAPTER   11. 

OF  HAPPINESS. 

Section  I.— Of  Ends. 

I.  Every  human  act  is  done  for  sonic  end  or 
purpose.  The  end  is  always  regarded  by  the  agent 
in  the  hght  of  something  good.  If  evil  be  done,  it 
is  done  as  leading  to  good,  or  as  bound  up  with 
good,  or  as  itself  being  good  for  the  doer  under 
the  circumstances  ;  no  man  ever  does  evil  for  sheer 
evil's  sake.  Yet  evil  may  be  the  object  of  the  \vill, 
not  by  itself,  nor  primarily,  but  in  a  secondary  way, 
as  bound  up  with  the  good  that  is  willed  in  the 
first  place. 

2.  Many  things  willed  are  neither  good  nor  evil 
in  themselves.  There  is  no  motive  for  doing  them 
except  in  so  far  as  they  lead  to  some  good  beyond 
themselves,  or  to  deliverance  from  some  evil,  which 
deliverance  counts  as  a  good.  A  thing  is  willed, 
then,  either  as  being  good  in  itself  and  an  end  by 
itself,  or  as  leading  to  some  good  end.  Once  a 
thing  not  good  and  desirable  by  itself  has  been 
taken  up  by  the  will  as  leading  to  good,  it  may  be 
taken  up  again  and  again  without  reference  to  its 
tendency.  But  such  a  thing  was  not  originally 
taken  up  except  in  view  of  good  to  come  of  it.     We 


OP  HAPPINES!> 


may  will  one  thing  as  leading  to  another,  an<j  that 
to  a  third,  and  so  on;  thus  one  wills  study  for 
learning,  learning  for  examination  purposes,  exami- 
nation for  a  commission  in  the  army,  and  the 
commission  for  glory.  That  end  in  which  the  will 
rests,  willing  it  for  itself  without  reference  to  any- 
thing beyond,  is  called  the  List  end. 

3.  An  end  is  either  objective  or  subjective.  The 
objective  end  is  the  thing  wished  for,  as  it  exists 
distinct  from  the  person  who  wishes  it.  The  sub- 
jective end  is  the  possession  of  the  objective  end. 
That  possession  is  a  fact  of  the  wisher's  own  being. 
Thus  money  may  be  an  objective  end  :  the  corre- 
sponding subjective  end  is  being  wealthy. 

4.  Is  there  one  subjective  last  end  to  all  the 
human  acts  of  a  given  individual  ?  Is  there  one 
supreme  motive  for  all  that  this  or  that  man  deliber- 
ately does  ?  At  first  sight  it  seems  that  there  is  not. 
The  same  individual  will  act  now  for  glory,  now 
for  lucre,  now  for  love.  But  all  these  different 
ends  are  reducible  to  one,  tliat  it  may  be  well  with 
him  and  his.  And  what  is  true  of  one  man  here,  is 
true  of  all.  All  the  human  acts  of  all  men  are  done 
for  the  one  (subjective)  last  end  just  indicated.  This 
end  is  called  happiness. 

5.  Men  place  their  happiness  in  most  different 
things ;  some  in  eating  and  drinking,  some  in  the 
heaping  up  of  money,  some  in  gambling,  some  in 
political  power,  some  in  the  gratification  of  affection, 
some  in  reputation  of  one  sort  or  another.  But  each 
one  seeks  his  own  speciality  because  he  thinks  that 
he  shall  be  happy,  that,   it   will  be  well  with    him, 


OF  ENDS. 


when  he  has  attained  that.  All  men,  then,  do  al! 
things  for  happiness,  though  not  all  place  their 
happiness  in  the  same  thing. 

6.  Just  as  when  one  goes  on  a  journc}',  he  need 
not  think  of  his  destination  at  every  step  of  his 
way,  and  yet  all  his  steps  are  directed  towards  his 
destination  :  so  men  do  not  think  of  happiness  in 
all  they  do,  and  yet  all  they  do  is  referred  to  happi- 
ness. Tell  a  traveller  that  this  is  the  wrong  way 
to  his  destination,  he  will  avoid  it  ;  convince  a  man 
that  this  act  will  not  be  well  for  him,  will  not  further 
his  happiness,  and,  wliilc  he  keeps  that  conviction 
principally  before  his  eyes,  he  will  not  do  the  act. 
But  as  a  man  who  began  to  travel  on  business,  may 
come  to  make  travelling  itself  a  business,  and  travel 
for  the  sake  of  going  about ;  so  in  all  cases  there  is 
a  tendency  to  elevate  into  an  end  that  which  was, 
to  start  with,  only  valued  as  a  means  to  an  end. 
So  the  means  of  happiness,  by  being  habitually 
pursued,  come  to  be  a  part  of  happiness.  Habit  is 
a  second  nature,  and  we  indulge  a  habit  as  we  gratifv 
nature.  This  tendency  works  itself  to  an  evil  ex- 
treme in  cases  where  men  are  become  the  slaves  ol 
habit,  and  do  a  thing  because  they  are  got  into  the 
way  of  doing  it,  though  they  allow  that  it  is  a  sad 
and  sorry  way,  and  leads  them  wide  of  true  happi- 
ness. These  instances  show  perversion  of  the  normal 
operation  of  the  will. 

Readings.— St.  Thos.,  la  2ie,  q.  i,  art.  4,  in  corp. ; 
ib.,  q.  I,  ait.  6.  7;  ib.,  q.  5.  art.  S;  Ar.,  Elh.,  I.,  vii.. 
4.  :i- 


OF   HAPPINESS. 


Section  II. — Dejiniticn  of  Happiness. 

1.  Though  all  men  do  all  things,  ii\  the  last 
resort,  that  it  may  be  well  with  them  and  theirs, 
thai  is,  for  happiness  vaguely  apprehended,  yet  when 
they  come  to  specify  what  happiness  is,  answers  so 
various  are  given  and  acted  upon,  that  we  might  be 
tempted  to  conclude  that  each  man  is  the  measure 
of  his  own  happiness,  and  that  no  standard  of  happi- 
ness for  all  can  be  defined.  But  it  is  not  so.  '  Man 
is  not  the  measure  of  his  ovv-n  happiness,  any  more 
than  of  his  own  health.  The  diet  that  lie  takes  to 
be  healthy,  may  prove  his  poison  ;  and  where  he 
looks  for  happiness,  he  may  find  the  extreme  of 
wretchedness  and  woe.  For  man  must  live  up  to 
his  nature,  to  his  bodily  constitution,  to  be  a  healthy 
man  ;  and  to  his  whole  nature,  but  especially  to  his 
mental  and  moral  constitution,  if  he  is  to  be  a  happy 
man.  And  nature,  though  it  admits  of  individual 
peculiarities,  is  specifically  the  same  for  all.  There 
will,  then,  be  one  definition  of  happiness  for  all  men, 
specifically  as  such. 

2.  Happiness  is  an  act,  not  a  state.  That  is  to  say, 
the  happiness  of  ;nan  does  not  lie  in  his  having 
something  done  to  him,  nor  in  his  being  habitually 
able  to  do  something,  but  in  his  actually  doing 
something.  "To  be  up  and  doing,"  that  is  happi- 
ness,— iv  ru)  ^i'jv  Koi  ii'epyelv.  {At.,  Eth.,  IX.,  ix.,  5.) 
This  is  proved  from  the  consideration  that  happi- 
ness is  the  crown  and  perfection  of  human  nature  ; 
but  the  perfection  of  a  thing  lies  in  its  ultimate  act, 
or  "second  act,"  tliat  is,  in  its  not  merely  being  able 


DEI-IS ITIOS    or   ILU'fLXHSS. 


10  act,  but  cicting.  But  action  is  of  two  sorts.  One 
proceeds  from  the  agent  to  some  outward  matter,  as 
cutting  and  burning.  This  action  cannot  be  happi- 
ness, for  it  does  not  perfect  the  agent,  but  rather 
the  patient.  There  is  another  sort  of  act  imnianent 
in  the  agent  himself,  as  feeHng,  understanding,  and 
willing:  these  perfect  the  agent.  Happiness  will  be 
found  to  be  one  of  these  immanent  acts.  Further- 
more, there  is  action  full  of  movement  and  change, 
and  there  is  an  act  done  in  stillness  and  rest.  The 
latter,  as  will  presently  appear,  is  happiness  ;  and 
partly  for  this  reason,  and  partly  to  denote  the 
exclusion  of  care  and  trouble,  happiness  is  often 
spoken  of  as  a  rest.  It  is  also  called  a  slate,  because 
one  of  the  elements  of  happiness  is  permanence. 
How  the  act  of  happiness  can  be  permanent,  will 
appear  hereafter. 

3.  Happiness  is  an  act  in  discharge  0/ the  Junction 
proper  to  man,  as  vuin.  There  is  a  function  proper 
to  the  eye,  to  the  ear,  to  the  various  organs  of  the 
human  body:  there  must  be  a  function  proper  to 
man  as  such.  That  can  be  none  of  the  functions  of 
the  vegetative  life,  nor  of  the  mere  animal  life  within 
him.  Man  is  not  happy  by  doing  what  a  rose-bush 
can  do,  digest  and  assimilate  its  food  :  nor  by  doing 
what  a  horse  does,  having  sensations  pleasurable 
and  painful,  and  muscular  feelings.  Man  is  happy 
by  doing  what  man  alone  can  do  in  this  world,  that 
is,  acting  by  reason  and  understanding.  Now  the 
human  will  acting  by  reason  may  do  three  things. 
It  may  regulate  the  passions,  notably  desire  and 
fear:    the    outcome    will    be    the    moral   virtues  of 


or   HAPPINESS. 


temperance  and  fortitude.  It  may  direct  the  under- 
standing, and  ultimately  the  members  of  the  body, 
in  order  to  the  production  of  some  practical  result 
in  the  external  world,  as  a  bridge.  Lastly,  it  may 
direct  the  understanding  to  speculate  and  think, 
contemplate  and  consider,  for  mere  contemplation's 
sake.  Happiness  must  take  one  or  other  of  these 
three  lanes. 

4.  First,  then,  happiness  is  not  the  pradice  of  the 
moral  virtues  of  temperance  and  fortitude.  Temperance 
makes  a  man  strong  against  the  temptations  to  irra- 
tionality and  swinishness  that  come  of  the  bodily 
appetites.  But  happiness  lies,  not  in  deliverance 
from  what  would  degrade  man  to  the  level  of  the 
brutes,  but  in  something  which  shall  raise  man  to 
the  highest  level  of  human  nature.  Fortitude,  again, 
is  not  exercised  except  in  the  hour  of  danger  ;  but 
happiness  lies  in  an  environment  of  security,  not  of 
danger.  And  in  general,  the  moral  virtues  can  be 
exercised  only  upon  occasions,  as  they  come  and 
go ;  but  happiness  is  the  light  of  the  soul,  that  must 
burn  with  steady  flame  and  uninterrupted  act,  and 
not  be  dependent  on  chance  occurrences. 

5.  Secondly,  happiness  is  not  the  use  of  the  practical 
understanding  with  a  view  to  production.  Happiness 
is  an  end  in  itself,  a  terminus  beyond  which  the  act 
of  the  will  can  go  no  further ;  but  this  use  of  the 
understanding  is  in  view  of  an  ulterior  end,  the  thing 
to  be  produced.  That  product  is  either  useful  or 
artistic  ;  if  useful,  it  ministers  to  some  further  end 
still;  if  artistic,  it  ministers  to  contemplation. 
Happiness,  indeed,  is  no  o\t  rcise  of  the   practical 


DEFINITION   OF   HAl'riNESS. 


understanding  whatever.  The  noblest  exercises  of 
practical  understanding  are  for  military  purposes 
and  for  statesmanship.  But  war  surely  is  not  an 
end  in  itself  to  any  right-minded  man.  Statecraft, 
too,  has  an  end  before  it,  the  happiness  of  the 
people.  It  is  a  labour  in  view  of  happiness.  We 
must  follow  down  the  third  lane,  and  say  : 

6.  Happiness  is  the  act  of  the  speculative  understand- 
ivg  contemplating  for  contempt  a  iiun's  sake.  This  act 
has  all  the  marks  of  happiness.  It  is  the  highest 
act  of  man's  highest  power.  It  is  the  most  capable 
of  continuance.  It  is  fraught  with  pleasure,  purest 
and  highest  in  quality.  It  is  of  all  acts  the  most 
self-sufficient  and  independent  of  environment,  pro- 
vided the  object  be  to  the  mind's  e3e  visible.  It  is 
welcome  for  its  own  sake,  not  as  leading  to  any 
further  good.  It  is  a  life  of  ease  and  leisure :  man 
is  busy  that  he  may  come  to  ease. 

7.  Aristotle  says  of  this  life  of  continued  active 
contemplation  : 

"Such  a  life  will  be  too  good  for  man;  for  not  as 
he  is  man  will  he  so  live,  but  inasmuch  as  there  is  a 
divine  element  in  his  composition.  As  much  as  this 
element  excels  the  compound  into  which  it  enters, 
so  much  does  the  act  of  the  said  element  excel  any 
act  in  any  other  line  of  virtue.  If,  then,  the  under- 
standing is  divine  in  comparison  with  man,  the  life 
of  the  understanding  is  divine  in  comparison  with 
human  life.  We  must  not  take  the  advice  of  those 
who  tell  us,  that  being  man,  one  should  cherish  the 
thoughts  of  a  man,  or  being  mortal,  the  thoughts  0/ 
a  mortal,  but  so  far  as  in  us  lies,  we  must  play  the 


<e  OF  HAPPINESS. 


immortal  {aOauaTi^ew),  and  do  all  in  our  power  tc 
live  by  the  best  element  in  our  nature  :  for  though 
that  element  be  slight  in  quantity,  in  power  and  in 
value  it  far  outweighs  all  the  rest  of  our  being.  A 
man  may  well  be  reckoned  to  be  that  which  is  the 
ruling  power  and  the  better  part  in  him,  .  .  ,  What 
is  proper  to  eacii  creature  by  nature,  is  best  and 
sweetest  for  each  :  such,  then,  is  for  man  the  life 
of  the  understanding,  if  the  understanding  pre- 
eminently is  man,"  (Ar.,  Eth.,  X.,  vii.,  8,  9.) 

8.  But  if  happiness  is  an  act  in  discharge  of  the 
function  proper  to  man  as  man  (n.  3),  how  can  it  be 
happiness  to  lead  a  life  which  Aristotle  says  is  too 
good  for  man?  The  solution  of  this  paradox  is 
partly  contained  in  the  concluding  words  of  Aristotle 
above  quoted,  and  will  still  further  appear  presently 
(s.  iv.,  n.  I,  p.  21),  wliere  we  shall  argue  that  human 
life  is  a  state  of  transition  in  preparation  for  a 
higher  life  of  the  soul,  to  be  lived,  according  to  the 
natural  order,  when  the  compound  of  soul  and  body 
would  no  longer  exist. 

g.  Tin  act  0/  c.jntcniplation,  in  which  h.ippiness  con- 
sists, must  rest  upon  a  habit  of  contemplation,  which  is 
intellectual  virtue.  An  act,  to  be  perfection  and  hap- 
piness, must  be  done  easily,  sweetly,  and  constantly. 
But  no  act  of  the  intellect  can  be  so  done,  unless  it 
rests  upon  a  corresponding  habit.  If  the  habit  has 
not  been  acquired,  the  act  will  be  done  fitfully,  at 
random,  and  against  the  grain,  like  the  music  of  an 
untrained  singer,  or  the  composition  of  a  schoolboy. 
Painful  study  is  not  happiness,  nor  is  any  studied 
act.      iiappiuesa  is  ihe  play  of  a  mind  thai   is,  if  not 


DEI- IS n ION    01'    HAPPINESS.  li 

master  of,  yet  at  home  with  its  subject.  As  the 
intellect  is  man's  best  and  noblest  power,  so  is  iiuel- 
lectual  virtue,  absolutely  speaking,  the  best  virtue  of 
man. 

10.  The  use  of  the  speculative  understanding  is 
descernible  in  many  things  to  which  even  the  common 
crowd  turn  for  happiness,  as  news  of  that  which  is 
of  little  or  no  practical  concern  to  self,  sight-seeing, 
theatre-going,  novels,  poetry,  art,  scenery,  as  well 
as  speculative  science  and  high  literature.  A  certain 
speculative  interest  is  mixed  up  with  all  practical 
work:  the  mind  lingers  on  the  speculation  apart 
from  the  end  in  view. 

11.  The  act  of  contemplation  cannot  he  steadily  carried 
on,  as  is  necessary  to  happiness,  except  in  the  midst  of 
easy  surroundings.  Human  nature  is  not  self-sufficient 
for  the  work  of  contemplation.  There  is  need  of 
health  and  vigour,  and  the  means  of  maintaining  it, 
food,  warmth,  interesting  objects  around  you,  leisure, 
absence  of  distracting  care  or  pain.  None  would 
call  a  man  happy  upon  the  rack,  except  by  way  of 
maintaining  a  thesis.  The  happiness  of  a  disem- 
bodied spirit  is  of  course  independent  of  bodily 
conditions,  but  it  would  appear  that  there  are  con- 
ditions of  environment  requisite  for  even  a  spirit's 
contemprlation. 

12.  Happiness  must  endure  to  length  of  days. 
Happiness  is  the  perfect  good  of  man.  But  no 
good  is  perfect  that  will  not  last.  One  swallow 
does  not  make  a  summer,  nor  does  one  fine  day: 
neitl'.er  is  man  made  blessed  and  happy  by  one  day, 
nor  by  a  brief  time.     The  human  mind  lighting  upon 


12  OF   HAPPINESS. 


e^ood  soon  asks  the  question,  Will  this  last?  If  the 
answer  is  negative,  the  good  is  not  a  complete  good 
and  there  is  no  complete  happiness  coining  of  if-. 
If  the  answer  is  affirmative  and  false,  once  more 
that  is  not  a  perfect  happiness  that  rests  on  a 
delusion.  The  supreme  good  of  a  rational  beinp;  is 
not  found  in  a  fool's  paradise.  We  want  an  ansvv-ei 
affirmative  and  true  :  This  happiness  shall  last. 

13.  We  now  sum  up  and  formulate  the  defiidtion 
of  happiness  as  follows  :  Happiness  is  a  bringing  oj 
th.e  sold  to  act  according  to  the  habit  of  the  best  and  most 
perfect  virtue,  that  is,  the  virtue  of  the  specnlative  intel- 
lect, borne  out  by  easy  surroundings,  and  enduring  tn 
length  of  days  —  ivepjeia  '^v-)/t]<;  kut  dperrjv  Tr)i' 
apLcrrTjv  Kal  TekeLOTCLTrjv  iv  fiifp  reXeicp.  {At.,  Eih., 
I.,  vii.,  15,  16.) 

14.  Man  is  made  for  society.  His  happiness 
must  be  in  society,  a  social  happiness,  no  lonely 
contemplation.  He  must  be  happy  in  the  con- 
sciousness of  his  own  intellectual  act,  and  happy  in 
the  discernment  of  the  good  that  is  in  those  around 
him,  whom  he  loves.  Friends  and  dear  ones  are 
no  small  part  oi  those  easy  surroundings  that  are  the 
condition  of  happiness. 

15.  Happiness — final,  perfect  happiness — is  not 
in  fighting  and  struggling,  in  so  far  as  a  struggle 
supposes  evil  present  and  imminent  ;  nor  in  bene- 
volence, so  far  as  that  is  founded  upon  misery 
needing  relief.  We  fight  for  the  conquest  and 
suppression  of  evil ;  we  are  benevolent  for  the  heal- 
ing of  misery.  But  it  will  be  happiness,  in  the 
limit,  as  mathematicians  speak,  to  wish   well  to  all 


/ 


HAPPINESS   OiExS    10   MAN.  13 


in  n  society  wlicrc  it  is  well  with  all,  and  to  struggle 
with  truth  for  its  own  sake,  ever  grasping,  never 
mastering,  as  Jacob  wrestled  with  God. 

Readings. — Ar.,  Eth.,  I.,  \ii.  viii.,  5  to  end;  I.,  x.,  8 
to  end  ;  I.,  v.,  6;  VII.,  xiii.,  3;  IX.,  ix.;  X.,  vii.  ; 
X.,  viii.,  I — 10;  Ar.,  Pol.,  IV.  (al.  VII.),  i.,  3 — 10; 
IV.,iii.,  7,  8;  St.Thos.,  la  2as,  q.  3,  art.  2;  t6.,  q.  3, 
art.  5.  in  corp.,  ad  3  ;   ;'/;.,  q.  2,  art.  6. 

Section  III. — Happiness  open  to  man. 

"  And  now  as  he  looked  and  saw  the  whole 
Hellespont  covered  with  the  vessels  of  his  fleet,  and 
all  the  shore  and  every  plain  about  Abydos  as  full  as 
possible  of  men,  Xerxes  congratulated  himself  on 
his  good  fortune;  but  after  a  little  while,  he  wept. 
Then  Artabanns,  the  King's  uncle,  when  he  heard 
that  Xerxes  was  in  tears,  went  to  him,  and  said : 
'How  different,  sire,  is  what  thou  art  now  doing 
from  what  thou  didst  a  little  while  ago  !  Then 
thou  didst  congratulate  thyself ;  and  now,  beliold  1 
thou  weepest.'  'There  came  upon  me,'  replied 
he,  '  a  sudden  pity,  when  I  thought  of  the  shortness 
of  man's  life,  and  considered  that  of  all  this  host, 
so  numerous  as  it  is,  not  one  will  be  alive  when  a 
hundred  years  are  gone  by.'  'And  yet  there  are 
sadder  things  in  life  than  that,'  returned  the  other. 
'Short  as  our  time  is,  there  is  no  man,  whether  it 
be  among  this  multitude  or  elsewhere,  who  is  so 
happy,  as  not  to  have  felt  the  wish — I  will  not  say 
once,  but  full  many  a  time — that  he  were  dead 
rather  than  alive.  Calamities  fall  upon  us,  sick- 
cesses   vex    and    harass   us,    and    make    life,    short 


<4  OF   HAPPINESS 


thou[;li  it  be,  to  appear  long.  So  death,  throu^'h 
the  wretchedness  of  our  hfe,  is  a  most  sweet  refuge 
to  our  race ;  and  God,  who  gives  us  the  tastes 
that  we  enjoy  of  pleasant  times,  is  seen,  in  his  very 
gift,  to  be  envious."   (Herodotus,  vii.,  45,  46.) 

I.  It  needs  no  argument  to  show  that  happi- 
ness, as  defined  in  the  last  section,  can  never  be 
perfectly  realized  in  this  life,  Aristotle  took  his 
definition  to  represent  an  ideal  to  be  approximated 
to,  not  attained.  He  calls  his  sages  "happy  as 
men  "  (Eth.,  I.,  x.,  16),  that  is,  imperfectly,  as  all 
things  human  are  imperfect.  Has  Aristotle,  then, 
said  the  last  word  on  happiness  ?  Is  perfect  happi- 
ness out  of  the  reach  of  the  person  whom  in  this 
mortal  life  we  call  man  ?  However  that  may  be, 
it  is  plain  that  man  desires  perfect  liappiness.  Every 
man  desires  that  it  may  be  perfectly  well  with  him 
and  his,  although  many  have  mistaken  notions  of 
what  their  own  well-being  consists  in,  and  few  can 
define  it  philosophically.  Still  they  all  desire  it. 
The  higher  a  man  stands  in  intellect,  the  loftier  and 
vaster  his  conception  of  happiness,  and  the  stronger 
his  yearning  after  it.  This  argues  that  the  desire  oj 
happiness  is  natural  to  )iian  :  noi  in  the  sense  in 
which  eating  and  drinking  are  natural,  as  being 
requirements  of  his  animal  nature,  but  in  the  same 
way  that  it  is  natural  to  him  to  think  and  converse, 
his  rational  nature  so  requiring.  It  is  a  natural  desire, 
as  springing  from  that  which  is  the  specific  charac- 
teristic of  human  nature,  distinguishing  it  from  mere 
animal  nature,  namely  reason.  It  is  a  natural  desire 
in  the  best  and  highest  sense  of  the  word. 


/lAPPINESS   OVEN    10   AJylN.  i^ 


2.  Contentment  is  not  happiness.  A  man  is 
content  with  little,  but  it  takes  an  immensity  of 
good  to  satisfy  all  his  desire,  and  render  him  per- 
fectly happy.  When  we  say  we  are  content,  we 
signify  that  we  should  naturally  desire  more,  but 
acquiesce  in  our  present  portion,  seeing  that  more 
is  not  to  be  had.  "Content,"  says  Dr.  Bain,  "is 
not  the  natural  frame  of  any  mind,  but  is  the  result 
of  compromise." 

3.  But  is  not  this  desire  of  unmixed  happiness 
unreasonable  ?  Are  we  not  taught  to  set  bounds 
to  our  desire  ?  Is  not  moderation  a  virtue,  and 
contentment  wisdom  ?  Yes,  moderation  is  a  virtue, 
but  it  concerns  only  the  use  of  means,  not  the 
apprehension  of  ends.  The  patient,  not  to  say  the 
physician,  desires  medicines  in  moderation,  so  much 
as  will  do  him  good  and  no  more;  but,  so  far  as  his 
end  is  health,  he  desires  all  possible  health,  perfect 
health.  The  last  end,  then,  is  to  be  desired  as  a 
thing  to  possess  without  end  or  measure,  fully  and 
without  defect. 

4.  We  have  then  these  facts  to  philosophise  on  : 
that  all  men  desire  perfect  happiness :  that  this 
desire  is  natural,  springing  from  the  rational  soul 
which  sets  man  above  the  brute  :  that  on  earth  man 
may  attain  to  contentment,  and  to  some  h.appiness, 
but  not  to  perfect  happiness :  that  consequently 
nature  has  planted  in  man  a  desire  for  which  on 
earth  she  has  provided  no  adequate  satisfaction. 

5.  If  the  course  of  events  were  lUful  and  way- 
ward, so  that  eftects  started  up  without  causes,  and 
like    causes    under  like  conditions  produced  unlike 


to  OF  11  AT  PI  NESS 


effects,  and  anything  might  come  of  anything,  there 
would  be  no  such  thing  as  that  which  we  call  nature. 
When  we  speak  of  nature,  we  imply  a  regular  and 
definite  flow  of  tendencies,  this  thing  springing  from 
that  and  leading  to  that  other;  nothing  from  noth- 
ing,   and    nothing    leading   nowhere  ;    no    random, 
aimless  proceedings;  but  definite  results  led  up  to 
by  a  regular  succession  of  steps,  and  surely  ensuing 
unless  something  occurs  on  the  way  to  thwart  the 
process.     How  this  is  reconciled  with  Creation  and 
Freewill,  it   is  not  our  province  to  enquire :  suffice 
it  to  say  that  a  natural  agent  is  opposed  to  a  free 
one,   and  creation  is  the  starting-point  of  nature. 
But  to  return.      Everywhere  we    say,   "  this  is  for 
that,"  wherever  there  appears  an  end  and  consum- 
mation to  whicli   the  process  leads,  provided  it  go 
on  unimpeded.     Now  every  event  that  happens  is  a 
part  of  some  process  or  other.     Every  act  is  part  of 
a   tendency.      There   are  no  loose  facts  in  nature, 
no    things    that   happen,  or  are,  otherwise  than  in 
consequence  of  something  that    has    happened,  or 
been,  before,  and  in  view  of  something  else  that  is 
to  happen,   or  be,    hereafter.      The   tendencies    of 
nature    often    run   counter  to  one  another,  so  that 
the    result    to  which    this    or   that  was  tending  is 
frustrated.     But  a  tendency  is  a  tendency,  although 
defeated  ;  this  was  for  tJiat,  although  that  for  which 
it  was  has  got  perverted  to  something  else.     There 
is  no  tendency  which  of  itself  fails  and  comes  to 
naught,  apart  from  interference.     Such  a  universal 
and  absolute  break-down  is  unknown  to  nature. 
6,  All  this  appears  most  clearly  in  organic  beings. 


HAPPINESS   OPEN   TO    MAN.  17 

plants  and  animals.  Organisms,  except  the  very 
lowest,  are  compounds  of  a  number  of  different 
parts,  each  fulfilling  a  special  function  for  the  good 
of  the  whole.  There  is  no  idle  constituent  in  an 
organic  body,  none  without  its  function.  What 
are  called  rudimentary  organs,  even  if  they  serve  no 
purpose  in  the  individual,  have  their  use  in  the 
species,  or  in  some  higher  genus.  In  the  animal 
there  is  no  idle  natural  craving,  or  appetite.  True, 
in  the  individual,  whether  plant  or  animal,  there  are 
many  potentialities  frustrate  and  made  ^■oi(l.  That 
is  neither  here  northere  in  philosophy.  Philosophy 
deals  not  with  individuals  but  with  species,  not  with 
Bucephalus  or  Alexander,  but  with  horse,  man.  It 
is  nothing  to  philosophy  that  of  a  thousand  seeds 
there  germinate  perhaps  not  ten.  Enough  that  one 
seed  ever  germinates,  and  that  all  normal  speci- 
mens are  apt  to  do  the  like,  meeting  with  proper 
environment.  That  alone  shows  that  seed  is  not 
an  idle  product  in  this  or  that  class  of  living  beings. 
7.  But,  it  will  be  said,  not  everything  contained 
in  an  organism  ministers  to  its  good.  There  is 
refuse  material,  only  good  to  get  rid  of:  there  are 
morbid  growths ;  there  is  that  tendency  to  decay, 
by  which  sooner  or  later  the  organism  will  perish. 
First,  then,  a  word  on  diseases.  Diseases  are  the 
diseases  of  the  individual ;  not  of  the  race.  The 
race,  as  such,  and  that  is  what  the  philosopher 
studies,  is  healthy :  all  that  can  be  imputed  to  the 
race  is  liability  to  disease.  That  liability,  and  the 
tendency  to  decay  and  die,  are  foimd  in  living 
things,  because  their  essence  is  of  finite  perfection  : 

9 


1 8  OF   HAPPINESS. 


there  cannot  be  a  plant  or  animal,  that  has  not 
these  drawbacks  in  itself,  as  such.  They  represent, 
not  the  work  of  nature,  but  the  failure  of  nature, 
and  the  point  beyond  which  nature  can  no  further 
go. 

8.  On  the  preceding  observations  Aristotle  for- 
mulated the  great  maxim — called  by  Dr.  Thomas 
Browne,  Rcligio  Medici,  p.  i.,  sect.  15,  "  the  only 
indisputable  axiom  in  philosophy," — Nature  does 
nothing  iti  vain.  (Ar.,  Pol.,  I.,  viii.,  12  ;  De  Anima,  III., 
ix.,  6;  Depart,  animal.,  1.  i.,  p.  641,  ed.  Bekker.) 

g.  The  desire  of  happiness,  ample  and  complete., 
beyond  what  this  world  can  afford,  is  not  planted  in 
man  by  defect  of  his  nature,  but  by  the  perfection  of  his 
nature,  and  in  view  of  his  further  perfection.  This 
desire  has  not  the  character  of  a  drawback,  a  thing 
that  cannot  be  helped,  a  weakness  and  decay  of 
nature,  and  loss  of  power,  like  that  which  sets  in 
with  advancing  years.  A  locomotive  drawing  a 
train  warms  the  air  about  it :  it  is  a  pity  that  it 
should  do  so,  for  that  radiation  of  heat  is  a  loss  of 
power :  but  it  cannot  be  helped,  as  locomotives  are 
and  must  be  constructed.  Not  such  is  the  desire 
of  perfect  happiness  in  the  human  breast.  It  is 
not  a  disease,  for  it  is  no  peculiarity  of  individuals, 
but  a  property  of  the  race.  It  is  not  a  decay,  for 
it  grows  with  the  growing  mind,  being  feeblest 
in  childhood,  when  desires  are  simplest  and  most 
easily  satisfied,  and  strongest  where  mental  life  is 
the  most  vigorous.  It  is  an  attribute  of  great 
minds  in  proportion  to  their  greatness.  To  be 
without  it,   would   be   to  live  a   minor  in   point  of 


HAPPINESS   OPEN   TO   MAN.  19 

intellect,  not  much  removed  from  imbecility.  It 
is  not  a  waste  of  energy,  rather  it  furnishes  the 
motive-power  to  all  human  volition.  It  comes  of  the 
natural  working  of  the  understanding  that  discerns 
good,  and  other  good  above  that,  and  so  still  higher 
and  higher  good  without  limit ;  and  of  the  natural 
working  of  the  will,  following  up  and  fastening  upon 
what  the  understanding  discerns  as  good.  The 
desire  in  question,  then,  is  by  no  means  a  necessary 
evil,  or  natural  fiaw,  in  the  human  constitution. 

10.  It  follows  that  the  desire  of  perfect  happi- 
ness is  in  man  by  the  normal  growth  of  his  nature, 
and  for  the  better.  But  it  would  be  a  vain  desire, 
and  objectless,  if  it  were  essentially  incapable  of 
satisfaction  :  and  man  would  be  a  made  and 
abiding  piece  of  imperfection,  if  there  were  no 
good  accessible  to  his  intellectual  nature  sufficient 
to  meet  its  proper  exigence  of  perfect  happiness. 
But  no  such  perfect  happiness  is  attainable  in  this 
world.  Therefore  there  must  be  a  world  to  come,  in 
which  he  who  was  man,  now  a  disembodied  spirit, 
but  still  the  same  person,  shall  under  due  condi- 
tions find  a  perfect  good,  the  adequate  object  of  his 
natural  desire.  Else  is  the  deepest  craving  of  human 
nature  in  vain,  and  man  himself  is  vanity  of  vanities. 

11.  It  may  be  objected  that  there  is  no  need  to 
go  beyond  this  world  to  explain  how  the  desire  of 
perfect  happiness  is  not  in  vain.  It  works  like 
the  desire  of  the  philosopher's  stone  among  the 
old  alchemists.  The  thing  they  were  in  search  of 
was  a  chimera,  but  in  looking  for  it  they  found  a 
real  good,  modern  chemistry.     In  like  manner,  it  is 


20  OF  HAPPIXr.SS. 


contended,  though  perfect  happiness  is  not  to  l)e 
had  anywhere,  yet  the  desire  of  it  keeps  men  from 
sitting  down  on  the  path  of  progress ;  and  thus 
to  that  desire  we  owe  all  our  modern  civilization, 
and  all  our  hope  and  prospect  of  higher  civilization 
to  come.  Without  questioning  the  alleged  fact 
about  the  alchemists,  we  may  reply  that  modern 
chemistry  has  dissipated  the  desire  of  the  philoso- 
pher's stone,  but  modern  civilization  has  not  dissi- 
pated the  desire  of  perfect  happiness  :  it  has  deepened 
it,  and  perhaps  rather  obscured  the  prospect  of  its 
fulfilment.  A  desire  that  grows  with  progress  cer- 
tainly cannot  be  satisfied  by  progressing.  But  if  it 
is  never  to  be  satisfied,  what  is  it  ?  A  goad  thrust 
into  the  side  of  man,  that  shall  keep  him  coursing 
along  from  century  to  century,  like  lo  under  the 
gadfly,  only  to  find  himself  in  the  last  century  as  far 
from  the  mark  as  in  the  first.  Apart  from  the  hope, 
of  the  world  to  come,  is  the  Italy  of  to-day  happier 
than  the  Italy  of  Antoninus  Pius?  Here  is  a  modern 
Italian's  conclusion:  "I  have  studied  man,  I  have 
examined  nature,  I  have  passed  whole  nights  ob- 
serving the  starry  heavens.  And  what  is  the  result 
of  these  long  investigations  ?  Simply  this,  that  the 
life  of  man  is  nothing;  that  man  himself  is  nothing; 
that  he  will  never  penetrate  the  mystery  which  sur- 
rounds the  universe.  With  this  comfortless  con- 
viction I  descend  into  the  grave,  and  console  myself 
with  the  hope  of  speedy  annihilation.  The  lamp 
goes  out ;  and  nothing,  nothing  can  rekindle  it.  So, 
Nature,  I  return  to  thee,  to  be  united  with  thee  for 
evei.    Never  wilt  thou  have  received  into  thy  bosom 


OBJECT  OF   PERFECT   HAPPINESS.  i! 


a  more  unhappy  being."  {La  Nullitii  delta  Vita.  Bv 
G.  P.,  1882.) 

This  is  an  extreme  case,  but  much  of  modern 
progress  tends  this  way.  Civilization  is  not  happi- 
ness, nor  is  the  desire  for  happiness  othi  r  than  vain, 
if  it  merely  leads  to  increased  civilization. 

Readings. — St.  Thomas,  C.  G.,  iii.,  48;  Newman's 
Historical  Sketches — Conversion  of  Augustine;  Mill's 
Autobiography,  pp.  133 — 149. 

Section  IV. — Of  the  Object  of  Perfect  Happiness. 

I.  As  happiness  is  an  act  of  the  speculative  intel- 
lect contemplating  (s.  ii.,  n.  6,  p.  9),  so  the  thing  thus 
contemplated  is  the  object  of  happiness.  As  happiness 
is  the  subjective  last  end,  so  will  this  object,  inasmuch 
as  the  contemplation  of  it  yields  perfect  happiness, 
be  the  objective  last  end  of  man.  (s.  i.,  nn.  3.  4,  p.  4.)  As 
perfect  happiness  is  possible,  and  intended  by  nature, 
so  is  this  objective  last  end  attainable,  and  should 
be  attained.  But  attained  by  man  ?  Aye,  there's 
the  rub.  It  cannot  be  attained  in  this  life,  and  after 
death  man  is  no  more :  a  soul  out  of  the  body  is  not 
man.  About  the  resurrection  of  the  body  philosophy 
knows  nothing.  Nature  can  make  out  no  title  to 
resurrection.  That  is  a  gratuitous  gift  of  God  in 
Christ.  V\h.eT\  \i  {dikes  e'iiQci,stHpcbitnatnra.  Philo- 
sophy deals  only  with  the  natural  order,  with  man 
as  man,  leaving  the  supernatural  order,  or  the  privi- 
leges and  status  of  man  as  a  child  of  God,  to  the 
higher  science  of  Scholastic  Theology.  Had  God 
so  willed  it,  there  might  have  been  no  supernatural 
at    all.     Philosophy   shows    the   world    as  it   would 


32  OF  HAPPINESS. 


have  been  on  that  hypothesis.  In  that  case,  then, 
man  would  have  been,  as  Aristotle  represents  him, 
a  being  incapable  of  perfect  happiness ;  but  he  who 
is  man  could  have  become  perfectly  happy  in  a  state 
other  than  human,  that  is,  as  a  disembodied  spirit. 
Peter  is  man  :  the  soul  of  Peter,  after  separation,  is 
man  no  longer ;  but  Peter  is  not  one  person,  and 
Peter's  soul  out  of  the  body  another  person ;  there 
is  but  one  person  there,  with  one  personal  history 
and  liabilities.  The  soul  of  Peter  is  Peter  still : 
therefore  the  person  Peter,  or  he  who  is  Peter,  attains 
to  happiness,  but  not  the  man  Peter,  as  man,  apart 
from  the  supernatural  privilege  of  the  resurrection. 
Hence  Aristotle  well  said,  though  he  failed  to  see 
the  significance  of  his  own  saying,  that  man  should 
aim  at  a  life  of  happiness  too  good  for  man.  (s.  ii., 
nn.  7,  8,  p.  9.) 

2.  The  object  of  happiness, — the  objective  last 
end  of  man, — will  be  that  which  the  soul  contem- 
plating in  the  life  to  come  will  be  perfectly  happy 
by  so  doing.  The  soul  will  contemplate  all  in- 
tellectual beauty  that  she  finds  about  her,  all  heights 
of  truth,  all  the  expanse  of  goodness  and  mystery 
of  love.  She  will  see  herself:  a  vast  and  curious 
sight  is  one  pure  spirit :  but  that  will  not  be  enough 
for  her,  her  eye  travels  beyond.  She  must  be  in 
company,  live  with  myriads  of  pure  spirits  like 
herself, — see  them,  study  them,  and  admire  them, 
and  converse  with  them  in  closest  intimacy.  To- 
gether they  must  explore  the  secrets  of  all  creation 
even  to  the  most  distant  star:  they  must  read  the 
laws  of  the  universe,  which  science  laboriously  spells 


OBJ  EC  1    OF  PER  FECI    HAPPINESS 


out  here  below :  they  must  ranj::e  from  science  to 
art,  and  from  facts  to  possibiHtics,  till  even  their 
pure  intellect  is  baffled  by  the  vast  intricacy  of 
things  that  might  be  and  are  not:  but  yet  they  are 
net  satisfied.  A  point  of  convcrgency  is  wanted  for 
all  these  vistas  of  being,  whence  they  may  go  forth, 
and  whither  they  may  return  and  meet:  otherwise 
the  soul  is  distracted  and  lost  in  a  maze  of  in- 
coherent wandering,  crying  out.  Whence  all  this? 
and  what  is  it  for  ?  and  above  all,  whose  is  it  ? 
These  are  the  questions  that  the  human  mind  asks 
in  her  present  condition  :  much  more  \\\\\  she  ask 
them  then,  when  wonders  are  multiplied  before  her 
gaze  :  for  it  is  the  same  soul  there  and  here.  Here 
men  are  tormented  in  mind,  if  they  find  no  answer 
to  these  questions.  Scientific  men  cannot  leave 
theology  alone.  They  will  not  be  happy  there 
without  an  answer.  Their  contemplation  will  still 
desiderate  something  beyond  all  finite  being,  actual 
or  possible.  Is  that  God  ?  It  is  nothing  else.  But 
God  duells  in  light  inaccessible,  where  no  creature, 
as  such,  can  come  near  Him  nor  see  Him.  The 
beauties  of  creation,  as  so  many  streams  of  tendency, 
meet  at  the  foot  of  His  Throne,  and  there  are  lost. 
Their  course  is  towards  Him,  and  is,  so  far  as  it 
goes,  an  indication  of  Him  :  but  He  is  infinitely, 
unspeakably  above  them.  No  intelligence  created, 
or  creatable,  can  arrive  by  its  own  natural  perception 
to  see  Him  as  He  is:  for  mind  can  only  discern 
what  is  proportionate  to  itself:  and  God  is  out  of 
proportion  with  all  the  being  of  all  possible  creatures. 
It  is  only  by  analogy  that  the  word  being,  or  any 


24  OF  HAPPINESS. 

other  word  whatever  can  be  apphed  to  Him.  As 
Plato  says,  "  the  First  Good  is  not  Being,  but  over 
and  be3'ond  Being  in  dignity  and  power."  {Rep. 
509,  B.) 

3.  To  see  God  face  to  face,  which  is  called  the 
beatific  vision,  is  not  the  natural  destiny  of  man, 
nor  of  any  possible  creature.  Such  happiness  is  not 
the  happiness  of  man,  nor  of  angel,  but  of  God 
Himself,  and  of  any  creature  whom  He  ma}'  deign 
by  an  act  of  gratuitous  condescension  to  invite  to 
sit  as  guest  at  His  own  royal  table.  That  God  has 
so  invited  men  and  angels,  revelation  informs  us. 
Scholastic  theology  enlarges  upon  that  revelation, 
but  it  is  beyond  philosophy.  Like  the  resurrection 
of  the  body,  and  much  more  even  than  that,  the 
Beatific  Vision  must  be  relegated  to  the  realm  of 
the  Supernatural. 

4.  But  even  in  the  natural  order  the  object  oj 
perfect  happiness  is  God.  The  natural  and  super- 
natural have  the  same  object,  but  differ  in  the  mode 
of  attainment.  By  supc^nLtural  grace,  bearing 
perfect  fruit,  man  sees  God  with  the  eyes  of  his 
soul,  as  we  see  the  faces  of  our  friends  on  earth. 
In  perfect  happiness  of  the  natural  order,  creatures 
alone  are  directly  apprehended,  or  seen,  and  from 
the  creature  is  gathered  the  excellence  of  the  unseen 
God.  The  process  is  an  ascent,  as  described  by 
Plato,  from  the  individual  to  the  universal,  and 
from  bodily  to  moral  and  intellectual  beauty,  till  we 
reach  a  Beauty  eternal,  immutable,  absolute,  sub- 
stantial, and  self-existent,  on  which  all  other  beauties 
depend  for  their  being,  vvhile  it  is  independent  of 


OBJECT   or   PERFECT   HAPPINESS:  as 

thorn.  (Plato,  Syiuposinm,  210,  211.)  Unless  the 
ascent  be  prosecuted  thus  far,  the  contemplation  is 
inadequate,  the  happiness  incomplete.  The  mind 
needs  to  travel  to  the  beginning  and  end  of  things, 
to  the  Alpha  and  Omega  of  all.  The  mind  needs 
to  reach  some  perfect  good  :  some  ol)ject,  which 
though  it  is  be}ond  the  comprehension,  is  never- 
theless understood  to  be  the  very  good  of  goods, 
unalloyed  with  any  admixture  of  defect  or  im- 
perfection. The  mind  needs  an  infinite  object  to 
rest  upon,  though  it  cannot  grasp  that  object 
positively  in  its  infinity.  If  this  is  the  case  even 
with  the  human  mind,  still  wearing  "this  muddy 
vesture  of  decay,"  how  much  more  ardent  the 
longing,  as  how  much  keener  the  gaze,  of  the  pure 
spirit  after  Him  who  is  the  centre  and  rest  of  all 
intellectual  nature  ? 

5.  Creatures  to  contemplate  and  see  God  in,  are 
conditions  and  secondary  objects  of  natural  hap- 
piness. They  do  not  afford  happiness  finally  of 
themselves,  but  as  manifesting  God,  even  as  a 
mirror  would  be  of  little  interest  except  for  its 
power  of  rellection. 

6.  In  saying  that  God  is  the  object  of  happiness, 
we  must  remember  that  He  is  no  cold,  impersonal 
Beauty,  but  a  living  and  loving  God,  not  indeed  in 
the  order  of  nature  our  Father  and  Friend,  but  still 
our  kind  Master  and  very  good  Lord,  who  speaks 
to  His  servants  from  behind  the  clouds  that  hide 
His  face,  and  assures  them  of  His  abiding  favour 
and  approving  love.  More  than  that,  nature  cannot 
look  for:  such  aspiration  were  unratural,  unreason- 


l6  OF  HAPPINESS. 


able,  mere  madness  :  it  is  enough  for  the  creature; 
as  a  creature,  in  its  highest  estate  to  stand  before 
God,  hearing  His  voice,  but  seeing  not  His  coun- 
tenance, whom,  without  His  free  grace,  none  can 
look  upon  and  live. 

Reading. — St.  Thos.,  la  2se,  q.  2,  art.  8. 

Section  V. — Of  Iht  use  of  the  presen!  life. 

I.  Since  perfect  happiness  is  not  to  be  had  in 
this  mortal  life,  and  is  to  be  had  hereafter ;  since 
moreover  man  has  free  will  and  the  control  of  his 
own  acts ;  it  is  evidently  most  important  for  man  in 
this  life  so  to  control  and  rule  himself  here  as  to 
dispose  himself  for  happiness  there.  Happiness 
rests  upon  a  habit  of  contemplation  (s.  ii.,  n.  9,  p.  10), 
rising  to  God.  (s.  iv.,  n.  4,  p.  24.)  But  a  habit,  as  will 
be  seen,  is  not  formed  except  by  frequent  acts,  and 
may  be  marred  and  broken  by  contrary  acts.  It  is, 
then,  important  for  man  in  this  life  so  to  act  as  to 
acquire  a  habit  of  lifting  his  mind  to  God.  There 
are  two  things  here,  to  lift  the  mind,  and  to  lift  it  to 
God.  The  mind  is  not  lifted,  if  the  man  lives  not 
an  intellectual  life,  but  the  life  of  a  swine  wallowing 
in  sensual  indulgences;  or  a  frivolous  life,  taking 
the  outside  of  things  as  they  strike  the  senses,  and 
flitting  from  image  to  image  thoughtlessly ;  or  a 
quarrelsome  life,  where  reason  is  swallowed  up  in 
anger  and  hatred.  Again,  however  sublime  the 
speculation  and  however  active  the  intellect,  if  God 
is  not  constantly  referred  to,  the  mind  is  lifted 
indeed,  but  not  to  God.  It  is  wisdom,  then,  in 
man   during  this  life  to  look   to   God   everywhere, 


ACTS   LESS    VOLUNIARY 


and  ever  to  seek  His  face  ;  to  avoid  idleness,  an;^cr, 
intemperance,  and  pride  of  intellect.  For  the  mind 
will  not  soar  to  God  when  the  he;ut  is  far  from 
Him. 


CHAPTER    III. 

OF    HUMAN    ACTS. 

Section   I. —  What  makts  a  human  act  less  voiuntary. 

I   See  c.  i.,  nn.  2,  3,  4. 

2.  An  act  is  more  or  less  voluntary,  as  it  is  done 
with  more  or  less  knowledge,  and  proceeds  more  or 
less  fully  and  f)urely  from  the  will  properly  so  called. 
Whatever  diminishes  knowledge,  or  partially  sup- 
plants the  will,  takes  off  from  the  voluntariness  oi 
the  act.  An  act  is  rendered  less  voluntary  by  ignorance, 
by  passionate  desire,  and  by  fear. 

3.  If  a  man  has  done  something  in  ignorance 
either  of  the  law  or  of  the  facts  of  the  case,  and 
would  be  sorry  for  it,  were  he  to  find  out  what  he 
has  done,  tliat  act  is  involuntary,  so  far  as  it  is 
traceable  to  ignorance  alone.  Even  if  he  would  not 
be  sorry,  still  the  act  must  be  pronounced  not 
voluntary,  under  the  same  reservation.  Ignorance, 
sheer  ignorance,  takes  whatever  is  done  under  it 
out  of  the  region  of  volition.  Nothing  is  willed  but 
what  is  known.  An  ignorant  man  is  as  excusable 
as  a  drunken  one,  as  such, — no  more  and  no  less. 


?.8  OF   HUMAN    ACTS. 


The  difference  is,  that  drunkenness  generally  is 
voluntary;  ignorance  often  is  not.  But  ignorance 
may  be  voluntnry,  quite  as  voluntary  as  drunkenness. 
It  is  a  capital  folly  of  our  age  to  deny  the  possibility 
of  voluntary  intellectual  error.  Error  is  often 
voluntary,  and  (where  the  matter  is  one  that  the 
person  officially  or  otherwise  is  required  to  know) 
immoral  too.  A  strange  thing  it  is  to  say  that  "  it 
is  as  unmeaning  to  speak  of  the  immorality  of  an 
intellectual  mistake  as  it  would  be  to  talk  of  the 
colour   of  a    sound."   (Lecky,  European    Murals,  ii., 

202.) 

4.  There  is  an  ignorance  that  is  sought  on 
purpose,  called  affected  ignorance  (in  the  Shakspearian 
sense  of  the  word  affect),  as  when  a  man  will  not 
read  begging-letters,  that  he  may  not  give  anything 
away.  Such  ignorance  does  not  hinder  voluntariness. 
It  indicates  a  strong  will  of  doing  or  omitting,  come 
what  may.  There  is  yet  another  ignorance  called 
crass,  which  is  when  a  man,  without  absolutely 
declining  knowledge,  yet  takes  no  pains  to  acquire 
it  in  a  matter  where  he  is  aware  that  truth  is 
important  to  him.  Whatever  election  is  made  in 
consequence  of  such  ignorance,  is  less  voluntary, 
indeed,  than  if  it  were  made  in  the  full  light,  still 
it  is  to  some  extent  voluntary.  It  is  voluntary  in  its 
cause,  that  is,  in  the  voluntary  ignorance  that  led  to 
it.  Suppose  a  man  sets  up  as  a  surgeon,  having 
made  a  very  imperfect  study  of  his  art.  He  is 
aware,  that  for  want  of  knowledge  and  skill,  he 
shall  endanger  many  lives  :  still  he  neglects  oppor- 
tunities   of  making   himself    competent,    and    goes 


ACTS   LESS    VOLUNTARY  vi 

audaciously  to  work.  If  an}-  Iiarm  comes  of  his 
bungling,  he  can  plead  intellectual  error,  an  error 
of  judgment  for  the  time  being  ;  he  did  his  best  as 
well  as  he  kne\v  it.  Doubtless  he  did,  and  in  that 
he  is  unlike  the  malicious  maker  of  miischief :  still 
he  has  chosen  lightly  and  recklessly  to  hazard  a 
great  evil.  To  that  extent  his  will  is  bound  to  the 
evil :  he  has  chosen  it,  as  it  were,  at  one  remove. 

5.  Another  instance,  A  man  is  a  long  way  on 
to  seeing,  though  he  does  not  quite  see,  the  claims 
of  the  Church  of  Rome  on  his  allegiance  and  sub- 
mission.  He  suspects  that  a  little  more  prayer  and 
search,  and  he  shall  be  a  Roman  Catholic.  To 
escape  this,  he  resolves  to  go  travelling  and  give  up 
prayer.  This  is  affected  ignorance.  Another  has  no 
such  perception  of  the  claims  of  Catholicism.  He 
has  no  religion  that  satisfies  him.  He  is  aware 
speculatively  of  the  importance  of  the  religious 
(]uestion ;  but  his  heart  is  not  in  religion  at  all. 
With  Demas,  he  loves  the  things  of  this  world. 
Very  attractive  and  interesting  does  he  find  this 
life  ;  and  for  the  life  to  come  he  is  content  to  chance 
it.  This  is  crass  ignorance  of  religious  truth.  Such 
a  man  is  not  a  formal  heretic,  for  he  is  not  altogether 
wilful  and  contumacious  in  his  error.  Still  neither 
is  it  wholly  involuntary,  nor  he  wholly  guiltless. 

6.  Passionate  desire  is  not  an  affection  of  the  will, 
but  of  the  sensitive  appetite.  The  will  may  co- 
operate, but  the  passion  is  not  in  the  will.  The 
will  may  neglect  to  check  the  passion,  when  it 
might:  it  may  abet  and  infiame  it:  in  these  ways 
an  act  done  in  passion  is  a  voluntary  act.     Still  it 


30  OF   HUMAN   ACTS. 


becomes  voluntary  only  by  the  influx  of  the  will, 
positively  permitting  oi  stimulating:  it  is  not  volun- 
tary precisely  as  it  proceeds  from  passion  :  for 
voluntar}'  is  that  which  is  of  the  will.  It  belongs 
to  passion  to  bring  on  a  momentary  darkness  in  the 
understanding:  where  such  darkness  is,  there  is  so 
much  the  less  of  a  human  act.  But  passion  in  an 
adult  of  sane  mind  is  hardly  strong  enough,  of 
itself  and  wholly  without  the  will,  to  execute  any 
considerable  outward  action,  involving  the  voluntary 
muscles.  Things  are  often  said  and  done,  and  put 
down  to  passion  :  but  that  is  not  the  whole  account 
of  the  matter.  The  will  has  been  for  a  long  time 
either  feeding  the  passions,  or  letting  them  range 
unchecked  :  that  is  the  reason  of  their  present 
outburst,  which  is  voluntary  at  least  in  its  cause. 
Once  this  evil  preponderance  has  been  brought 
about,  it  is  to  be  examined  whether  the  will,  in 
calm  moods,  is  making  any  efforts  to  redress  the 
evil.  Such  efforts,  if  made,  go  towards  making  the 
effects  of  passion,  when  they  come,  involuntary,  and 
gradually  preventing  them  altogether. 

7.  What  a  man  does  from  fear^  he  is  said  to  do 
under  compulsion,  especially  if  the  fear  be  applied 
to  him  by  some  other  person  in  order  to  gain 
a  purpose.  Such  compulsory  action  is  distinguished 
in  ordinary  parlance  from  voluntary  action.  And 
it  is  certainly  less  voluntary,  inasmuch  as  the  will  is 
hedged  in  to  make  its  choice  between  two  evils,  and 
chooses  one  or  other  only  as  being  the  less  evil  ot 
the  two,  not  for  any  liking  to  the  thing  in  itself.  Still, 
all  things  considered,  the  thing  is  chosen,  and  the 


DETERMINANTS   OF   MORALITY.  31 


action  is  so  far  voluntary.  We  may  call  it  voUintary 
in  the  concrete,  and  involuntary  in  the  abstract.  The 
thing  is  willed  as  matters  stand,  but  in  itself  and 
apart  from  existing  need  it  is  not  liked  at  all.  But 
as  acts  must  be  judged  as  they  stand,  by  what  the 
man  wills  now,  not  by  what  he  would  will,  an  act 
done  under  fear  is  on  the  whole  voluntary.  At  the 
same  time,  fear  sometimes  excuses  from  the  obser- 
vance of  a  law,  or  of  a  contract,  which  from  the 
way  in  which  it  was  made  was  never  meant  to  bind 
in  so  hard  a  case.  Not  all  contracts,  however,  are 
of  this  accommodating  nature  ;  and  still  less,  all  laws. 
But  even  where  the  law  binds,  the  penalty  of  the 
law  is  sometimes  not  incurred,  when  the  law  was 
broken  through  fear. 

Readings. — Ar.,Z://i.,  III.,  i.;  St.Thos.,  la  2ae,  q.  6, 
art.  3  ;  ib.,  q.  6,  art.  6,  8 ;  ib.,  q.  yy,  art.  6. 

Section  II. — Of  the  determinants  of  morality  in  any  given 

action. 

1.  The  morality  of  any  given  action  is  determined  by 
three  elements,  the  end  in  view,  the  means  taken,  and  the 
circumstances  that  accompany  the  taking  of  the  said  means 
Whoever  knows  this  principle,  does  not  thereby  know 
the  right  and  wrong  of  every  action,  but  he  knows 
how  to  go  about  the  enquiry.  It  is  a  rule  of 
diagnosis. 

2.  In  order  to  know  whether  what  a  man  does 
befits  him  as  a  man  to  do,  the  first  thing  to  examine 
is  that  which  he  mainly  desires  and  wills  in  his 
action.  Now  the  end  is  more  willed  and  desired 
ihan  the  means.     He  who  steals  to  commit  adultery, 


OF   HUMAN   ACTS. 


says  Aristotle,  is  more  of  an  adulterer  than  a  thief. 
The  end  in  view  is  what  Hes  nearest  to  a  man'?  heart 
as  he  acts.  On  that  his  mind  is  chiefly  bp:nt ;  on 
that  his  main  purpose  is  fixed.  Though  the  end  i? 
last  in  the  order  of  execution,  it  is  first  and  foremost 
in  the  order  of  intention.  Therefore  the  end  in  view 
enters  into  morality  more  deeply  than  any  other 
element  of  the  action.  It  it  not,  however,  the  most 
obvious  determinant,  because  it  is  the  last  point  to 
be  gained ;  and  because,  v/hile  the  means  are  taken 
openly,  the  end  is  often  a  secret  locked  up  in  the 
heart  of  the  doer,  the  same  means  leading  to  many 
ends,  as  the  road  to  a  city  leads  to  many  homes 
and  resting-places.  Conversely,  one  end  may  be 
prosecuted  by  many  means,  as  there  are  many  road? 
converging  upon  one  goal, 

3.  If  morality  were  determined  by  the  end  in 
view,  and  by  that  alone,  the  doctrine  would  hold 
that  the  end  justifies  the  means.  That  doctrine  is 
false,  because  the  moral  character  of  a  human  act 
depends  on  the  thing  willed,  or  object  of  volition, 
according  as  it  is  or  is  not  a  fit  object.  Now  the 
object  of  volition  is  not  only  the  end  in  view,  but 
likewise  the  means  chosen.  Besides  the  end,  the 
means  are  likewise  willed.  Indeed,  the  means  are 
willed  more  immediately  even  than  the  end,  as  they 
have  to  be  taken  first. 

4.  A  good  action,  like  any  other  good  thing,  must 
possess  a  certain  requisite  fulness  of  being,  proper  to 
itself.  As  it  is  not  enough  for  the  physical  excel- 
lence of  a  man  to  have  the  bare  essentials,  a  body 
with    a   soul    animating  it.  but   there  is  needed    a 


DETERMINANTS   OF   MORALITY.  33 

certain  grace  of  form,  colour,  agility,  and  many 
accidental  qualities  besides  ;  so  for  a  good  act  it  is 
not  enough  that  proper  means  be  taken  to  a  proper 
end,  but  they  must  be  taken  by  a  proper  person,  at 
a  proper  place  and  time,  in  a  proper  manner,  and 
with  manifold  other  circumstances  of  propriety. 

5.  The  end  in  view  may  be  either  single,  as  when 
you  forgive  an  injury  solely  for  the  love  of  Christ : 
or  mulliple  co-ordinate,  as  when  you  forgive  both  for 
the  love  of  Christ  and  for  the  mediation  of  a  friend, 
and  are  disposed  to  forgive  on  either  ground  sepa- 
rately ;  or  multiple  subordinate,  as  when  you  would 
not  have  forgiven  on  the  latter  ground  alone,  but 
forgive  the  more  easily  for  its  addition,  having 
been  ready,  however,  to  forgive  on  the  former 
alone :  or  cumulative,  as  when  3'ou  forgive  on  a 
number  of  grounds  collectively,  on  no  one  of  which 
would  you  have  forgiven  apart  from  the  rest. 

6.  Where  there  is  no  outward  action,  but  only 
an  internal  act,  and  the  object  of  that  act  is  some 
good  that  is  willed  for  its  own  sake,  there  can  be  no 
question  of  means  taken,  as  the  end  in  view  is 
immediately  attained. 

7.  The  means  taken  and  the  circumstances  of 
those  means  enter  into  the  morality  of  the  act, 
formally  as  they  are  seen  by  the  intellect,  materially 
as  they  are  in  themselves.  (See  what  is  said  of 
ignorance,  c.  iii.,  s.  i,,  nn.  3 — 5,  p.  27.)  This  explains 
the  difference  between  formal  and  material  sin.  A 
material  sin  would  hQ  formal  also,  did  the  agent  know 
what  he  was  doing.  No  sin  is  culpable  that  is  not 
formal.     But,  as  has  been  said,  there  may  be  a  cul- 

D 


34  OP  HUMAN  ACTS. 


pable  perversion  of  the  intellect,  so  that  the  man  is 
the  author  of  his  own  obliquity  or  defect  of  vision. 
When  Saul  persecuted  the  Christians,  he  probably 
sinned  materially,  not  formally.  When  Caiphas 
spoke  the  truth  without  knowing  it,  he  said  well 
materially,  but  ill  formally. 

8.  In  looking  at  the  means  taken  and  the  circum- 
stances that  accompany  those  means,  it  is  important 
to  have  a  ready  rule  for  pronouncing  what  particular 
belongs  to  the  means  and  what  to  the  circumstances. 
Thus  Clytemnestra  deals  her  husband  Agamemnon 
a  deadly  stroke  with  an  axe,  partly  for  revenge, 
partly  that  she  may  take  to  herself  another  consort ; 
is  the  deadliness  of  the  blow  part  of  the  means 
taken  or  only  an  accompanying  circumstance  ? 
It  is  part  of  the  means  taken.  The  means  taken 
include  every  particular  that  is  willed  and  chosen  as 
making  for  the  end  in  view.  The  fatal  character  of 
the  blow  does  make  to  that  end  ;  if  Agamemnon 
does  not  die,  the  revenge  will  not  be  complete,  and 
life  with  Aegisthus  will  be  impossible.  On  the  other 
hand,  the  fact  that  Clytemnestra  is  the  wife  of  the 
Mian  svhom  she  murders,  is  not  a  point  that  her  will 
rests  upon  as  furthering  her  purpose  at  all  ;  it  is  an 
accompanying  circumstance.  This  method  of  distin- 
guishing means  from  circumstance  is  of  great  value 
in  casuistry. 

9.  It  is  clear  that  not  every  attendant  circum- 
stance affects  the  morality  of  the  means  taken. 
Thus  the  blow  under  which  Agamemnon  sank  was 
neither  more  nor  less  guiltily  struck  because  it  was 
dealt  with  an  axe,  because  it  was  under  pretence  of 


DETERMINANTS   OF  MORALITY. 


giving  him  a  bath,  or  because  his  feet  were  entangled 
in  a  long  robe.  These  circumstances  are  all  irrelevant. 
Those  only  are  relevant  which  attach  some  special 
reasonableness  or  unreasonableness  to  the  thing  done 
Thus  the  provocation  that  Clytcmnestra  had  from 
her  husband's  introduction  of  Cassandra  into  hei 
house  made  her  act  of  vengeance  less  unreasonable: 
on  the  other  hand  it  was  rendered  more  unreasonable 
by  the  circumstance  of  the  dear  and  holy  tie  that  binds 
wife  to  husband.  The  provocation  and  the  relation- 
ship were  two  relevant  circumstances  in  that  case. 

10. "But  it  happens  sometimes  that  a  circum- 
stance only  affects  the  reasonableness  of  an  action 
on  the  supposition  of  some  previous  circumstance  so 
affecting  it.  Thus  to  carry  off  a  thing  in  large  or 
small  quantities  does  not  affect  the  reasonableness  of 
the  carrying,  unless  there  be  already  some  other 
circumstance  attached  that  renders  the  act  good  or 
evil ;  as  for  instance,  if  the  goods  that  are  being 
removed  are  stolen  property.  Circumstances  of  this 
sort  are  called  aggravating — or,  as  the  case  may  be, 
extenuating — circumstances.  Circumstances  that  of 
themselves,  and  apart  from  any  previous  supposition, 
make  the  thing  done  peculiarly  reasonable  or  unrea- 
sonable, are  called  specifying  circumstances.  They 
are  so  called,  because  they  place  the  action  in 
some  species  of  virtue  or  vice  ;  whereas  aggravating 
or  extenuating  circumstances  add  to,  or  take  off 
from,  the  good  or  evil  of  the  action  in  that  species 
of  virtue  or  vice  to  which  it  already  belongs. 

II.  A  variety  of  specifying   circumstances   may 
place    one    and    the   same  action    in    many  various 


36  OF   HUMAN   ACTS. 


species  of  virtue  or  vice.  Thus  a  religious  robbing 
his  parents  would  sin  at  once  against  justice,  piety, 
and  religion.  A  nun  preferring  death  to  dishonour 
practises  three  virtues,  chastity,  fortitude,  and 
religion. 

12.  The  means  chosen  may  be  of  four  several 
characters  : — 

{a)  A  thing  evil  of  itself  and  inexcusable  under 
all  conceivable  circumstances ;  for  instance,  blas- 
phemy, idolatry,  lying. 

(6)  Needing  excuse,  as  the  killing  of  a  man,  the 
looking  at  an  indecent  object.  Such  things  are  not 
to  be  done  except  under  certain  circumstances  and 
with  a  grave  reason.  Thus  indecent  sights  may  be 
met  in  the  discharge  of  professional  duty.  In  that 
case  indeed  they  cease  to  be  indecent.  They  are 
then  only  indecent  when  they  are  viewed  without 
cause.  The  absence  of  a  good  motive  in  a  case  like 
this  commonly  implies  the  presence  of  a  bad  one, 

(c)  hidiffcrent,  as  walking  or  sitting  down. 

.{d)  Good  of  itself,  but  liable  to  be  vitiated  by 
circumstances,  as  prayer  and  almsgiving  ;  the  good 
of  such  actions  may  be  destroyed  wholly  or  in  part 
by  their  being  done  out  of  a  vain  motive,  or  unsea- 
sonably, or  indiscreetly. 

13.  It  is  said,  "  If  thy  eye  be  single,  thy  whole 
body  shall  be  lightsome."  (St.  Matt,  vi.,  22.)  The 
eye  is  the  intention  contemplating  the  end  in  view. 
Whoever  has  placed  a  good  end  before  him,  and 
regards  it  steadily  with  a  well-ordered  love,  never 
swerving  in  his  affection  from  the  way  that  reason 
would  have  him  love,  must  needs  take  towards  his 


bETERMlNANTS   OF   MORALITY.  3} 

end  those  means,  and  tliosc  only,  which  are  in  them- 
selves reasonable  and  just :  as  it  is  written  :  "  Thou 
shalt  follow  justly  after  that  which  is  just."  (Dc-ut. 
xvi.,  20.)  Thus  I  am  building  a  church  to  the  glory 
of  God ;  money  runs  short :  I  perceive  that  by 
signing  a  certain  contract  that  must  mean  grievous 
oppression  of  the  poor,  I  shall  save  considerable 
expense,  whereas,  if  I  refuse,  the  works  will  have  to 
be  abandoned  for  want  of  funds.  If  I  have  purely 
the  glory  of  God  before  my  eyes,  I  certainly  shall 
not  sign  that  contract :  for  injustice  I  know  can  bear 
no  fruit  of  Divine  glory.  But  if  I  am  bent  upon 
having  the  building  up  in  any  case,  of  course  I  shall 
sign  :  but  then  my  love  for  the  end  in  view  is  no 
longer  pure  and  regulated  by  reason  :  it  is  not  God 
but  myself  that  I  am  seeking  in  the  work.  Thus  an 
end  entirely  just,  holy,  and  pure,  purifies  and  sancti- 
fies the  m.eans,  not  formally,  by  investing  with  a 
character  of  justice  means  in  themselves  unjust, 
for  that  is  impossible, — the  leopard  cannot  change 
his  spots, — but  by  way  of  elimination,  removing 
unjust  means  as  ineligible  to  my  purpose,  and 
leaving  me  only  those  means  to  choose  from  which 
are  in  themselves  just. 

14.  With  means  in  themselves  indifferent,  the 
ease  is  otherwise.  A  holy  and  pious  end  does 
formally  sanctify  those  means,  while  a  wicked  end 
vitiates  them.  I  beg  the  reader  to  observe  what  sort 
of  means  are  here  in  question.  There  is  no  question 
of  means  in  themselves  or  in  their  circumstances 
unjust,  as  theft,  lying,  murder,  but  of  such  indif- 
ferent things  as  reading,  writing,  painting,  singing, 


58  OF   HUMAN    ACTS. 


travelling.  Whoever  travels  to  commit  sin  at  the 
end  of  his  journey,  his  very  travelling,  so  far  as  it  is 
referred  to  that  end,  is  part  of  his  sin  :  it  is  a  wicked 
journey  that  he  takes.  And  he  who  travels  to 
worship  at  some  shrine  or  place  o{  pilgrimage, 
includes  his  journey  in  his  devotion.  The  end  in 
view  there  sanctifies  means  in  themselves  indifferent. 

15.  As  a  great  part  of  the  things  that  we  do  are 
indifferent  as  well  in  themselves  as  in  the  circum- 
stances of  the  doing  of  them,  the  moral  character  of 
our  lives  depends  largely  on  the  ends  that  we 
habitually  propose  to  ourselves.  One  man's  great 
thought  is  how  to  make  money ;  what  he  reads, 
writes,  says,  where  he  goes,  where  he  elects  to 
reside,  his  very  eating,  drinking  and  personal  expen- 
diture, all  turns  on  what  he  calls  making  his  fortune. 
It  is  all  to  gain  money — quocimque  modo  rem.  Another 
is  active  for  bettering  the  condition  of  the  labouring 
classes  :  a  third  for  the  suppression  of  vice.  These 
three  men  go  some  way  together  in  a  common  orbit 
of  small  actions,  alike  to  the  eye,  but  morally  unlike, 
because  of  the  various  guiding  purposes  for  which 
they  are  done.  Hence,  when  we  consider  such 
pregnant  final  ends  as  the  service  of  God  and  the 
glory  of  a  world  to  come,  it  appears  how  vast  is  the 
alteration  in  the  moral  line  and  colouring  of  a  man's 
life,  according  to  his  practical  taking  up  or  setting 
aside  of  these  great  ends. 

16.  We  must  beware  however  of  an  exaggeration 
here.  The  final  end  of  action  is  often  latent,  not 
explicitly  considered.  A  fervent  worshipper  of  God 
wishes  to  refer  his  whole  self  with  all  that  he  does 


DETERMINANTS   OF    MORALITY.  39 

to  the  Divine  glory  and  service.  Yet  such  a  one 
will  eat,  drink,  and  be  merry  with  his  friends,  not 
thinking  of  God  at  the  time.  Still,  supposing  him 
to  keep  within  the  bounds  of  temperance,  he  is 
serving  God  and  doing  good  actions.  But  what  of 
a  man  who  has  entirely  broken  away  from  God, 
what  of  his  eating,  drinking,  and  other  actions  that 
are  of  their  kind  indifferent  ?  We  cannot  call  them 
sins:  there  is  nothing  wrong  about  them,  neither  in 
the  thing  done,  nor  in  the  circumstances  of  the 
doing,  nor  in  the  intention.  Pius  V.  condemned  the 
proposition:  "All  the  works  of  infidels  are  sins." 
Neither  must  we  call  such  actions  indifferent  in  the 
individual  who  does  them,  supposing  them  to  be 
true  human  acts,  according  to  the  definition,  and  not 
done  merely  mechanically.  They  are  not  indifferent, 
because  they  receive  a  certain  measure  of  natural 
goodness  from  the  good  natural  purpose  which  they 
serve,  namely,  the  conservation  and  well-being  of 
the  agent.  Every  human  act  is  either  good  or  evil  in 
him  who  docs  it.     I  speak  of  natural  goodness  only. 

17.  The  effect  consequent  upon  an  action  is  distin- 
guishable from  the  action  itself,  from  which  it  is  not 
unfrequently  separated  by  a  considerable  interval  of 
time,  as  the  death  of  a  man  from  poison  adminis- 
tered a  month  before.  The  effect  consequent  enters 
into  morality  only  in  so  far  as  it  is  either  chosen 
as  a  means  or  intended  as  an  end  (nn.  2,  3,  p.  31), 
or  is  annexed  as  a  relevant  circumstance  to  the 
means  chosen  (n.  g,  p.  34.).  Once  the  act  is  done, 
it  matters  nothing  to  morality  whether  the  effect 
consequent  actually  ensues  or  not,  provided  no  new 


40  Ot    HUMAN  ACTS. 


act  be  elicited  thereupon,  whether  of  commission 
or  of  culpable  omission  to  prevent.  It  matters 
not  to  morality,  but  it  does  matter  to  the  agent's 
claim  to  reward  or  liability  to  punishment  at 
the  hands  of  human  legislators  civil  and  eccle- 
siastical, 

i8.  As  soul  and  body  make  one  man,  so  the 
inward  and  outward  act— as  the  will  to  strike  and 
the  actual  blow  struck — are  one  human  act.  The 
outward  act  gives  a  certain  physical  completeness 
to  the  inward.  Moreover  the  inward  act  is  no 
thorough-going  thing,  if  it  stops  short  of  outward 
action  where  the  opportunity  offers.  Otherwise, 
the  inward  act  may  be  as  good  or  as  bad  morally 
as  inward  and  outward  act  together.  The  mere 
wish  to  kill,  where  the  deed  is  impossible,  may 
be  as  wicked  as  wish  and  deed  conjoined.  It 
may  be,  but  commonly  it  will  not,  for  this  reason, 
that  the  outward  execution  of  the  deed  reacts 
upon  the  will  and  calls  it  forth  with  greater 
intensity;  the  will  as  it  were  expands  where  it 
finds  outward  vent.  There  is  no  one  who  has 
not  felt  the  relative  mildness  of  inward  feelings 
of  impatience  or  indignation,  compared  with  those 
engendered  by  speaking  out  one's  mind.  Often 
also  the  outward  act  entails  a  long  course  of  pre- 
paration, all  during  which  the  inward  will  is 
sustained  and  frequently  renewed,  as  in  a  carefully 
planned  burglary. 

Readings. — St.Thos.,  la  2k,  q.  i8,  art.  t  ;  ih.y  q.  i8, 
art.  2,  in  corp.,  ad  i  ;  ib.,  q.  i8,  art.  3,  in  corp.,  ad 
2  ;  ih.,  q.  18,  art.  4 — 6  ;  /6.,  q.  18,  art.  8,  in  corp.,  ad 


PASSION 5    IN   GhNEHAL. 


2,  3 ;  i6.,  q.  i8,  art.  9,  in  corp.,  ad  3 ;  ib.,  q.  18,  art.  jo, 
3;  ih,f  q.  18,  art.  11,  in  corp.;  ib.,  q.  20,  art.  q,  iu 
Corp. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

OF  PASSIONS. 
Sfxtion   I. — Of  Passions  in  General. 

r.  A  PASSION  is  defined  to  be  :  A  movement  of  the 
irrational  part  of  the  soul,  attended  by  a  notable  altera- 
tion of  the  body,  on  the  apprehension  of  good  cr  nil 
The  soul  is  made  up  of  intellect,  will,  and  sensible 
appetite.  The  first  two  are  rational,  the  third 
irrational  :  the  third  is  the  seat  of  the  passionr. 
In  a  disembodied  spirit,  or  an  angel,  there  are  no 
senses,  no  sensible  appetite,  no  passions.  The 
angel,  or  the  departed  soul,  can  love  and  hate,  feai 
and  desire,  rejoice  and  grieve,  but  these  are  not 
passions  in  the  pure  spirit,  they  are  acts  of  intellect 
and  will  alone.  So  man  also  often  loves  and  hates, 
and  does  other  acts  that  are  synonymous  with  cor- 
responding passions,  and  yet  no  passion  is  there. 
The  man  is  working  with  his  calm  reason  :  his 
irrational  soul  is  not  stirred.  To  an  author,  when 
he  is  in  the  humour  for  it,  it  is  a  delight  to  be 
writing,  but  not  a  passionate  delight.  The  will  finds, 
satisfaction  in  the  act :  the  irrational  soul  is  not 
affected  by  it.  Or  a  penitent  is  sorry  for  his  sin  : 
he  sincerely  regrets  it  before  God :  his  will  i? 
heartily  turned  away,  and  wishes  that  that  sin  had 


OF    PASSIONS. 


never  been :  at  the  same  time  his  eye  is  dry, 
his  features  unmoved,  not  a  sigh  does  he  utter, 
and  yet  he  is  truly  sorry.  It  is  important  tc 
bear  these  facts  in  mind :  else  we  shall  be  con- 
tinually mistaking  for  passions  what  are  pure  acta 
of  will,  or  vice  versa,  misled  by  the  identity  of 
name. 

2.  The  great  mark  of  a  passion  is  its  sensible 
working  of  itself  out  upon  the  body, — what  Dr.  Bain 
calls  "the  diffusive  wave  of  emotion.''  Without 
this  mark  there  is  no  passion,  but  with  it  are  other 
mental  states  besides  passions,  as  we  define  them. 
All  strong  emotion  affects  the  body  sensibly,  but  not 
all  emotions  are  passions.  There  are  emotions  that 
arise  from  and  appertain  to  the  rational  portion 
of  the  soul.  Such  are  Surprise,  Laughter,  Shame. 
There  is  no  sense  of  humour  in  an}'  but  rational 
beings ;  and  though  dogs  look  ashamed  and  horses 
betray  curiosity,  that  is  only  inasmuch  as  in  these 
higher  animals  there  is  something  analogous  to  what 
is  reason  in  man.  Moreover  passions  are  conversant 
with  good  and  evil  affecting  sense,  but  the  objects 
of  such  emotions  as  those  just  mentioned  are  not 
good  and  evil  as  such,  common  parlance  notwith- 
standing, whereby  we  are  said  to  laugh  at  a  bon  mot, 
or  "  a  good  thing."' 

3.  Love  is  a  generic  passion,  having  for  its 
species  desire  and  delight,  the  contraries  of  which 
are  abhorrence  and  pain.  Desire  is  of  absent  good  ; 
abhorrence  is  of  absent  evil ;  delight  is  in  present 
good;  pain  is  at  present  evil.  The  good  and  the  evil 
which  is  the  object  of  any  passion   must  be  appre- 


PASSIONS   IN   GENERAL. 


"3 


hcnded  by  sense,  or  by  imagination   in   a   sensible 
way,  whether  itself  be  a  thing  of  sense  or  not. 

4.  Desire  and  abhorrence,  delight  and  pain, 
are  conversant  with  gooi.1  and  evil  simply.  But 
good  is  often  attainable  only  by  an  effort,  and  evil 
avoidable  by  an  effort.  The  effort  that  good  costs 
to  attain  casts  a  shade  of  evil  or  undesirablcncss 
over  it :  we  may  shrink  from  the  effort  while  coveting 
the  good.  Again,  the  fact  of  evil  being  at  all  avoid- 
able is  a  good  thing  about  such  evil.  If  we  call 
evil  black,  and  good  white,  avoidable  evil  wilJ  be 
black  just  silvering  into  grey:  and  arduous  good 
will  be  white  with  a  cloud  on  it.  And  if  the  white 
attracts,  and  the  black  repels  the  appetite,  it  appears 
that  arduous  good  is  somewhat  distasteful,  to  wit,  to 
the  faint-hearted;  and  avoidable,  or  vincible,  evil  has 
its  attraction  for  the  man  of  spirit.  About  these 
two  objects,  good  hard  of  getting  and  evil  hard  of 
avoidance,  arise  four  other  passions,  hope  and  despair 
about  the  former,  fear  and  daring  about  the  latter. 
Hope  goes  out  towards  a  difficult  good:  despair  flies 
from  it,  the  difficulty  here  being  more  repellent  than 
the  good  is  attractive.  Fear  flies  from  a  threatening 
«vil :  w^hile  daring  goes  up  to  the  same,  drawn  by 
the  likelihood  of  vanquishing  it.  Desire  and  abhor- 
rence, delight  and  pain,  hope  and  despair,  fear  and 
daring,  with  anger  and  hatred  (of  which  presentl)-)» 
complete  our  list  of  passions. 

5.  Aiistotle  and  his  school  of  old,  called  Peri- 
patetics, recommended  the  moderation  of  the 
passions,  not  their  extirpation.  The  Stoics  on  the 
other  hand  contended  that  the  model  man,  the  sage, 


44  OP  PASSIONS. 

should  be  totally  devoid  of  passions.      This    cele- 
brated dispute  turned   largely  on  the  two   schools 
not    understanding    the    same    thing  by  the    word 
passion.    Yet  not  entirely  so.    There  was  a  residue  of 
real  difference,  and  it  came  to  this.     If  the  sensitive 
appetite  stirs  at  all,  it  must  stir  in  one  or  other  of 
nine  ways  corresponding  to  the  nine  passions  which 
we  have  enumerated.     Such  an  emotion  as  Laughter 
affects  the    imagination   and  the  sensitive   part    of 
man,  and  of  course  the  body  visibly,  but  it  does  not 
stir  the  sensitive  appetite,  since  it  does  not  prompt 
to  action.     To  say  then  that  a  man  has  no  passions, 
means  that  the  sensitive  appetite  never  stirs  within 
him,  but  is  wholly  dead.     But  this  is  impossible,  as 
the    Stoic  philosopher  was  fain  to    confess    when 
he  got  frightened  in  a  storm  at   sea.      Having   no 
passions  cannot  in  any  practical  sense  mean  having 
no  movements  of  the  sensitive  appetite,  for  that  will 
be   afoot  of  its   own   proper  motion  independent  of 
reason  :    but  it  may  mean  cherishing  no  passions, 
allowing  none  to  arise  unresisted,  but    suppressing 
their  every  movement  to  the  utmost  that  the  will  can. 
In   that  sense  it  is  a  very  intelligible  and  practical 
piece  of  advice,  that  the  wise  man  should  labour  to 
have  no  passions.      It  is  the  advice  embodied   in 
Horace's    Nil    admirari,    Talleyrand's    "No    zeal," 
Beaconsfield's  "  Beware  of  enthusiasm."      It  would 
have  man  to  work  like  a  scientific  instrument,  calm  as 
a  chronometer,  regulated  by  reason  alone.     This  was 
the    Stoic    teaching,    this    the  perfection  that  they 
inculcated,  quite  a   possible  goal  to  make  for,  if  not 
to  attain.     And   it   is  worth  a   wise  man's  while  to 


PASSIO.WS    IN    GENERAL.  aj 

consider,  whether  he  should  bend  his  efforts  in  this 
direction  or  not.  The  determination  here  taken  and 
acted  upon  will  elaborate  quite  a  different  character 
of  man  one  way  or  the  other.  The  effort  made  as 
the  Stoics  direct,  would  mean  no  yielding  to  excite- 
ment, no  poetry,  no  high-strung  devotion,  no  rapture, 
no  ecstasy,  no  ardour  of  love,  no  earnest  rhetoric 
spoken  or  listened  to,  no  mourning,  no  rejoicing 
other  than  the  most  conventional,  to  the  persistent 
smothering  of  whatever  is  natural  and  really  felt,  no 
tear  of  pity  freely  let  ilow,  no  touch  of  noble  anger 
responded  to,  no  scudding  before  the  breeze  ot 
indignation, — all  this,  that  reason  may  keep  on  the 
even  tcnour  of  her  way  undisturbed. 

6.  The  fault  in  this  picture  is  that  it  is  not  the 
picture  of  a  man,  but  of  a  spirit.  He  who  being 
man  should  try  to  realize  it  in  himself,  would  fall 
short  of  human  perfection.  For  though  the  sensi- 
tive appetite  is  distinguished  from  the  will,  and  the 
two  may  clash  and  come  in  conflict,  yet  they  are  not 
two  wholly  independent  powers,  but  the  one  man 
is  both  will  and  sensitive  appetite,  and  he  rarely 
operates  according  to  one  power  without  the  other 
L)eing  brought  into  corresponding  play.  There  is  a 
similar  concomitance  of  the  operations  of  intellect 
and  imagination.  What  attracts  the  sensitive 
appetite,  commonly  allures  also  the  affective  will, 
though  on  advertence  the  elective  will  may  reject  it. 
On  the  other  hand,  a  strong  affection  and  election 
of  the  will  cannot  be  without  the  sensitive  appetite 
being  stirred,  and  that  so  strongly  that  the  motion  is 
notable  in  the  body, — in  other  words,  is  a   passion. 


46  OF   PASSIOMS. 


Passion  is  the  natural  and  in  a  certain  degree  the 
inseparable  adjunct  of  strong  volition.  To  check 
one  is  to  check  the  other.  Not  only  is  the  passion 
repressed  by  repressing  the  volition,  but  the  repres- 
sion of  the  passion  is  also  the  repression  of  the 
volition.  A  man  then  who  did  his  best  to  repress 
all  movements  of  passion  indiscriminately,  would 
lay  fetters  on  his  will,  lamentable  and  cruel  and 
impolitic  fetters,  where  his  will  was  bent  on  any 
object  good  and  honourable  and  well-judged. 

7.  Again,  man's  will  is  reached  by  two  channels, 
from  above  downwards  and  from  below  upwards :  it 
is  reached  through  the  reason  and  through  the 
imagination  and  senses.  By  the  latter  channel  it 
often  receives  evil  impressions,  undoubtedly,  but 
not  unfrequently  by  the  former  also.  Reason  may 
be  inconsiderate,  vain,  haughty,  mutinous,  unduly 
sceptical.  The  abuse  is  no  justification  for  closing 
either  channel.  Now  the  channel  of  the  senses  and 
of  the  imagination  is  the  wider,  and  in  many  cases 
affords  the  better  passage  of  the  two.  The  will  that 
is  hardly  reached  by  reason,  is  approached  and  won 
by  a  pathetic  sight,  a  cry  of  enthusiasm,  a  threat 
that  sends  a  tremor  through  the  limbs.  Rather 
I  should  say  the  affective  will  is  approached  in  this 
way:  for  it  remains  with  the  elective  will,  on  ad- 
vertence and  consultation  with  reason,  to  decide 
whether  or  not  it  shall  be  won  to  consent.  But 
were  it  not  for  the  channel  of  passion,  this  will  could 
never  have  been  approached  at  all  even  by  reasons 
the  most  cogent.  Rhetoric  often  succeeds,  where 
mere  dry  logic  would  have  been  thrown  away.     God 


r.l5S/0.V5    /.V    GENERAL.  45 


help  vast  numbers  of  the  human  race,  if  their  wills 
were  approachable  only  through  their  reasons  I  They 
would  indeed  be  fixtures. 

8.  Another  fact  to  notice  is  the  liability  of 
reason's  gaze  to  become  morbid  and  as  it  were 
inflamed  by  unremitting;  exercise.  I  do  not  here 
allude  to  hard  study,  but  to  overcurious  scanning 
of  the  realities  of  this  life,  and  the  still  greater 
realities  and  more  momentous  possibilities  of  the 
world  to  come.  There  is  a  sense  of  the  surroundings 
being  too  nmch  for  us,  an  alarm  and  a  giddiness,  that 
comes  of  sober  matter-of-fact  thought  over-much 
prolonged.  Then  it  happens  that  one  or  more 
undeniable  truths  are  laid  hold  of,  and  considered  in 
strong  relief  and  in  isolation  from  the  rest:  the  result 
is  a  distorted  and  partial  view  of  truth  as  a  whole, 
and  therewith  the  mind  is  troubled.  Here  the 
kindlier  passions,  judiciously  allowed  to  play,  come 
in  to  soothe  the  wound  and  soreness  of  pure  intel- 
lect, too  keen  in  its  workings  for  one  who  is  not  yet 
a  pure  spirit. 

9.  Moral  good  and  evil  are  prcdicable  only  of 
human  acts,  in  the  technical  sense  of  the  term.  (c.  i., 
nn.  2 — 4,  p.  41.)  As  the  passions  by  definition  (c.  iv., 
s.  i.,  n.  I,  p.  41)  are  not  human  acts,  they  can  never  be 
morally  evil  of  themselves.  But  they  are  an  occasion 
of  moral  evil  in  this  way.  They  often  serve  to  wake 
up  the  slumbering  Reason.  To  that  end  it  is 
necessary  that  they  should  start  up  of  themselves 
without  the  call  of  Reason.  This  would  be  no 
inconvenience,  if  the  instant  Reason  awoke,  and 
adverted  to  the  tumult  and  stir  of  Passion,  she  rouM 


or   PASSIONS. 


take  command  of  it,  and  where  she  saw  fit,  quell  it. 
But  Reason  has  no  such  command,  except  in  cases 
where  she  has  acquired  it  by  years  of  hard  fighting. 
Passion  once  afoot  holds  en  her  course  against  the 
dictate  of  Reason.  True,  so  long  as  it  remains  mere 
Passion,  and  Reason  is  not  dragged  away  by  it,  no 
consent  of  the  will  given,  no  voluntary  act  elicited, 
still  less  carried  into  outward  effect, — so  long  as 
things  remain  thus,  however  Passion  may  rage, 
there  is  no  moral  evil  done.  But  there  is  a  great 
temptation,  and  in  great  temptation  many  men  fall. 
The  evil  is  the  act  of  free  will,  but  the  pressure  on 
the  will  is  the  pressure  of  Passion.  But  Passion 
happily  is  a  young  colt  amenable  to  discipline. 
Where  the  assaults  of  Passion  are  resolutely  and 
piously  withstood,  and  the  incentives  thereto 
avoided — unnatural  and  unnecessary  incentives  I 
mean — Passion  itself  acquires  a  certain  habit  of 
obedience  to  Reason,  which  habit  is  moral  virtue 
Of  that  presently 

TO.  In  a  men  of  confirmed  habits  of  moral 
virtue.  Passion  starts  up  indeed  independently  of 
Reason,  but  then  Reason  ordinarily  finds  little  diffi- 
culty in  regulating  the  Passion  so  aroused.  In  a 
certain  high  and  extraordinary  condition  of  human 
nature,  not  only  has  Reason  entire  mastery  over 
Passion  wherever  she  finds  it  astir,  but  Passion 
cannot  stir  in  the  first  instance,  without  Reason 
calling  upon  it  to  do  so.  In  this  case  the  torpor  of 
the  will  deprecated  above  (n.  7)  is  not  to  be  feared, 
because  Reason  is  so  vigorous  and  so  masterful  as  to 
be  adequate  to  range  everywhere  and  meet  all  emer- 


OF  DESIRE.  49 


gencies  without  the  goad  of  Passion.  This  state  is 
called  by  divines  the  date  of  integrity.  In  it  Adam 
was  before  he  sinned.  It  was  lost  at  the  Fall,  and 
has  not  been  restored  by  the  Redemption.  It  is  not 
a  thing  in  any  way  due  to  human  nature  :  nothing 
truly  natural  to  man  was  forfeited  by  Adam's  sin. 
It  is  no  point  of  holiness,  no  guerdon  of  victory, 
this  state  of  integrity,  but  rather  a  being  borne  on 
angel's  wings  above  the  battle.  But  one  who  has 
no  battle  in  his  own  breast  against  Passion,  may  yet 
suffer  and  bleed  and  die  under  exterior  persecution  : 
nay,  he  may,  if  he  wills,  let  in  Passion  upon  himself, 
to  fear  and  grieve,  when  he  need  not.  So  did  the 
Second  Adam  in  the  Garden  of  Gethsemane. 

Readings. — St.  Thos.,  la,  q.  8i,  art.  2,  in  corp. ; 
id.,  la  2£E,  q.  23,  art.  i,  in  corp.  ;  ib.,  q.  23,  art.  2,  in 
Corp.  ;  Cicero,  Tnsc.  Disp.,  iv.,  cc.  17 — 26;  St.  Aug., 
De  Civitate  Dei,  ix.,  cc.  4,  5  ;  Ar,  Eth.,  III.,  v.,  3,  4 ; 
lb.,  I,,  xiii.,  15 — 17  ;  St.  Thos.,  3a,  q.  15,  art.  4;  id., 
la  2ai,  q.  59,  art.  5;  Plato,  Tiniaus,  6g,  b,  e  :  70,  A. 

Section  II. — Of  Desire. 

I.  Desires  are  eiXhev physical  cravings,  by  moderns 
called  appetites ;  or  physical  desires  or  tastes,  called 
desires  proper.  The  appetites  have  their  beginning 
in  bodily  uneasiness.  They  are  felt  needs  of  some- 
thing required  for  the  animal  maintenance  of  the 
individual  or  of  the  race.  The  objects  of  the 
several  appetites  are  Meat  and  Drink,  Warmth  or 
Coolness,  Exercise  and  Repose,  Sleep,  Sex.  The 
object  of  mere  appetite  is  marked  by  quantity  only, 
not  by  quality.     That  is  to  say,  the  thing  is  sought 


50  OF   PASSIONS. 


for  in  the  vague,  in  a  certain  amount  sufTicient  to 
supply  the  want,  but  not  this  or  that  variety  of  the 
thing.  The  cry  of  a  hungry  man  is,  "  Give  me  to 
eat,"  if  very  hungry,  "  Givo  me  much:"  but  so  far 
as  he  is  under  the  mere  dominion  of  appetite  he 
does  not  crave  any  particular  article  of  food,  vege- 
table or  animal  :  he  wants  quantity  merely.  So  of 
thirst,  so  of  all  the  appetites,  where  there  is  nothing 
else  but  appetite  present. 

2.  Jjut  if  a  thirsty  man  cries  for  champagne,  or 
a  hungry  man  fancies  a  venison  pasty,  there  is 
another  element  beyond  appetite  in  that  demand. 
On  the  matter  of  the  physical  craving  there  is 
stamped  the  form  of  a  psychical  desire.  The 
psychical  clement  prescribes  a  quality  of  the  objects 
sought.  The  thirsty  man  thus  prompted  no  longer 
wants  drink  but  wine  :  the  man  mewed  up  within 
floors  no  longer  calls  for  exercise,  but  for  a  horse  or 
a  bicycle.  It  is  obvious  that  in  man  the  appetites 
generally  pass  into  the  further  shape  of  psychical 
desire.  It  is  when  the  appetite  is  vehement,  or  the 
man  is  one  who  makes  slight  study  of  his  animal 
wants,  that  pure  appetite,  sheer  physical  craving,  is 
best  shown.  Darius  flying  before  his  conqueror  is 
ready  to  drink  at  any  source,  muddy  or  clear,  a  drink 
is  all  that  he  wants :  it  is  all  that  is  wanted  by 
St.  Paul  the  first  Hermit.  But  your  modern  lounger 
at  the  clubs,  what  variety  of  liquors  are  excogitated 
to  please  his  palate  ! 

3.  Not  all  psychical  desires  are  on  the  matter  of 
appetite  ;  they  may  be  fixed  on  any  good  whatsoever 
of  body  or  of  mind.      Many  p-^ychical   desires  are 


OP  DESIRE.  SI 


not  passions  at  all,  but  reside  exclusively  in  the 
superior  part  of  the  soul,  in  the  will  prompted  by 
the  urnlerstanding,  and  do  not  affect  the  body  in  any 
sensible  way.  Such  for  instance  is  the  great  desire 
of  happiness.  Those  desires  that  are  passions  arc 
prompted,  not  by  the  understanding,  but  by  the 
imagination  or  fancy,  imaging  to  itself  some  parti- 
cular good,  not  good  in  general,  for  that  the  under- 
standing contemplates.  Fancy  paints  the  picture  ; 
or  if  sense  presents  it,  fancy  appropriates  and  embel- 
lishes it :  the  sensitive  appetite  fastens  upon  the 
representation  :  the  bodily  organs  sensibly  respond  ; 
and  there  is  the  passion  of  psychical  desire. 

4.  Physical  cravings,  or  appetites,  have  limited  objects : 
the  objects  of  psychical  desires  may  be  unlimited.  A 
thirsty  man  thirsts  not  for  an  ocean,  but  for  drink 
quantum  sufficit :  give  him  that  and  the  appetite  is 
gone.  But  the  miser  covets  all  the  money  that 
he  can  get  :  the  voluptuary  ranges  land  and  sea  in 
search  of  a  new  pleasure  :  the  philosopher  ever  longs 
for  a  higher  knowledge  :  the  saint  is  indefatigable  in 
doing  good.  Whatever  a  man  takes  to  be  an  end  in 
itself,  not  simply  a  means,  that  he  desires  without 
end  or  measure.  What  he  desires  as  a  means,  he 
desires  under  a  limitation,  so  far  forth  as  it  makes 
for  the  end,  so  much  and  no  more.  As  Aristotle 
says  of  the  processes  of  art,  "  the  end  in  view  is  the 
limit,"  TTt'/aa?  to  TeXc;  (cf.  c.  ii.,  s.  iii.,  n.  3,  p.  15) 
Whatever  is  desired  as  an  end  in  itself,  is  taken  to 
be  a  part  of  happiness,  or  to  represent  happiness, 
Happiness  and  the  object  that  gives  happiness  is 
the  one  thing  that  man  desires  for  itself,  and  desires 


<2  OF   PASSIONS. 


without  end  or  measure.  Unfortunately  he  is  often 
mistaken  in  the  choice  of  this  object.  He  often 
takes  for  an  end  what  is  properly  only  a  means. 
They  "  whose  god  is  their  belly,"  have  made  this 
mistake  in  regard  of  the  gratification  of  appetite. 
It  is  not  appetite  proper  that  has  led  to  this  per- 
version, but  psychical  desire,  or  appetite  inflamed 
by  the  artificial  stimulus  of  imagination.  For  one 
who  would  be  temperate,  it  is  more  important  to 
control  his  imagination  than  to  trouble  about  his 
appetite.  Appetite  exhausts  itself,  sometimes  within 
the  bounds  of  what  is  good  for  the  subject,  some- 
times beyond  them,  but  still  within  some  bounds;  but 
there  is  no  limit  to  the  cravings  bred  of  imagination. 

5.  By  this  canon  a  man  may  try  himself  to  dis- 
cover whether  or  not  a  favourite  amusement  is  gain- 
ing too  much  upon  him.  An  amusement  is  properly 
a  means  to  the  end,  that  a  man  may  come  away 
from  it  better  fitted  to  do  the  serious  work  of  his 
life.  Pushed  beyond  a  certain  point,  the  amuse- 
ment ceases  to  minister  to  this  end.  The  wise  man 
drops  it  at  that  point.  But  if  one  knows  not  where 
to  stop  :  or  if  when  stopped  in  spite  of  himself,  he 
is  restless  till  he  begin  again,  and  never  willingly 
can  forego  any  measure  of  the  diversion  that  comes 
within  his  reach,  the  means  in  that  case  has  passed 
into  an  end  :  he  is  enslaved  to  that  amusement, 
masmuch  as  he  will  do  anything  and  evei^  thing  for 

'ihe  sake  of  it.  Thus  some  men  serve  pl-r^asure^  and 
other  men  money. 

6.  Hence  is  apparent  the  folly  of  supposing  that 
crimes  against   property  are   prever.tible   fimply  by 


OF   DESIRE 


placing  it  within  the  power  of  all  members  fff  the 
community  easily  to  earn  an  honest  livelihood,  and 
therewith  the  satisfaction  of  all  their  natural  needs. 
It  is  not  merely  to  escape  cold  and  hunger  that  men 
turn  to  burglary  or  fraudulent  dealing :  it  is  inort; 
for  the  gratification  of  a  fancy,  the  satisfaction  of 
an  inordinate  desire.  Great  crimes  arc  not  com- 
mitted "to  keep  the  wolf  from  the  door,"  but 
because  of  the  wolf  in  the  heart,  the  overgrown 
psychical  desire,  which  is  bred  in  many  a  well- 
nourished,  warmly  clad,  comfortably  housed,  highl} 
educated  citizen.  There  is  a  sin  born  of  "  fulness 
of  bread." 

Readings. — St.  Thos.,  la  2se,  q.  30,  art.  3,  in 
corp. ;  ib.,  q.  30,  art.  4,  in  corp. ;  Ar.,  Eth.,  III.,  xi., 
I — 4  :  Ar.,  Pol.,  I.,  ix.,  13  ;  ib.,  II.,  vii.,  11 — 13. 

N.B. — The  division  of  desires  into  physical  and 
psychical  is  first  suggested  by  Plato,  who  {Rep.  55S 
D  to  559  c)  divides  them  as  necessary  and  un- 
necessary. Unnecessary  desires  he  treats  as  evil. 
What  Plato  calls  a  necessary,  Aristotle  calls  2i  physical, 
and  St.  Thomas  a  natural  desire.  Unfortunately, 
Aristotle  and  St.  Thomas  had  but  one  word  for  our 
English  two,  physical  and  natural.  Desires  that  are 
not  physical,  not  natural  nor  necessary  to  man  in 
his  animal  capacity,  may  be  highly  natural  and 
becoming  to  man  as  he  is  a  reasonable  being,  or 
they  may  be  highly  unbecoming.  These  psychical 
desires,  called  by  St.  Thomas  not  natural,  take  in 
at  once  the  noblest  and  the  basest  aspirations  of 
humanity. 


54  OI^-   PASSIONS. 

Section  III. — Of  Delight. 

1 .  Delight  like  desire  may  be  either  physical  oi 
psychical.  All  that  has  been  said  above  of  desire 
under  this  division  applies  also  to  delight,  which  is 
the  realization  of  desire.  This  division  does  not 
altogether  fall  in  with  that  into  sensual  delights  and 
intellectual  delights.  A  professional  wine-taster  could 
hardly  be  said  to  find  intellectual  delight  in  a 
bottle  of  good  Champagne,  real  Venve-Clicqiiot :  3'et 
certainly  his  is  a  psychical  delight,  no  mere  un- 
sophisticated gratification  of  appetite.  Sensual 
delights  then  are  those  delights  which  are  founded 
on  the  gratification  of  appetite,  whether  simple — 
in  which  case  the  delight  is  physical — or  studied 
and  fancy-wrought  appetite,  the  gratification  of 
which  is  psychical  delight.  Intellectual  delights  on 
the  other  hand  are  those  that  come  of  the  exercise 
of  intellect,  not  unsupported  by  imagination,  but 
where  appetite  enters  not  at  all,  or  only  as  a  remote 
adjunct,  albeit  the  delight  may  turn  upon  some 
sight  or  sound,  as  of  music,  or  of  a  fine  range  of 
hills.  Or  the  object  may  be  a  thing  of  intellect, 
pure  and  removed  from  sense  as  far  as  an  object 
of  human  contemplation  can  be,  for  instance,  the 
first  elements  of  matter,  freewill,  the  immensity  of 
God.  The  study  of  such  objects  yields  a  purer 
intellectual  delight  than  that  of  the  preceding.  But 
this  is  a  high  ground  and  a  keen  upper  air,  where 
few  can  tread  and  breathe. 

2.  A  man  has  more  complacency  in  himself  upon 
attaining  to  some  intellectual  delight  than  upon  a 


Oi'    DELIGHT  55 


sensual  satisfaction  :  he  is  prouder  to  have  solved  a 
problem  than  to  have  enjoyed  his  dinner.  Also, 
he  would  rather  forego  the  capacity  of  sensual  enjoy- 
ment than  that  of  intellectual  pleasure  ;  rather  lose 
his  sense  of  taste  than  his  science  or  his  scholar- 
ship, if  he  has  any  notable  amount  of  either. 
Again,  put  sensual  delight  in  one  scale,  and  in  the 
other  the  intellectual  delight  of  honour,  no  worthy 
specimen  of  a  man  will  purchase  the  pleasure  at 
the  price  of  honour.  The  disgrace  attaching  to 
certain  modes  of  enjoyment  is  sufficient  to  make 
men  shun  them,  very  pleasant  though  they  be  to 
sense.  Again,  sensual  delight  is  a  passing  thing, 
waxing  and  waning:  but  intellectual  delight  is  steady, 
grasped  and  held  firmly  as  a  whole.  But  sensual 
delight  comes  more  welcome  of  the  two  in  this 
that  it  removes  a  pre-existing  uneasiness,  as  hunger, 
weariness,  nervous  prostration,  thus  doing  a  medi- 
cinal office  :  whereas  no  such  office  attaches  in  the 
essential  nature  of  things  to  intellectual  delight, 
as  that  does  not  presuppose  any  uneasiness  ;  and 
though  it  may  remove  uneasiness,  the  removal  is 
difficult,  because  the  uneasiness  itself  is  an  obstacle 
to  the  intellectual  effort  that  must  be  made  to  derive 
any  intellectual  delight.  Sensual  enjoyment  is  the 
cheaper  physician,  and  ailing  mortals  mostly  resort 
to  that  door. 

3.  "  I  will  omit  much  usual  declamation  on  the 
dignity  and  capacity  of  our  nature  :  the  superiority 
of  the  soul  to  the  body,  of  the  rational  to  the 
animal  part  of  our  constitution  ;  upon  the  worthi« 
ness,  refinement,  and  delicacy  of  some  satisfactions, 


56  OF  PASSICNS. 


or  the  meanness,  grossness,  and  sensuality  of  others : 
because  I  hold  that  pleasures  differ  in  nothing  but 
in  continuance  and  intensity."  (Paley,  Moral  Philo- 
sophy, bk.  i.,  c.  vi.) 

In  opposition  to  the  above  it  is  here  laid  down 
that  delights  do  not  differ  in  continuance  and  intensity* 
that  is,  in  quantity,  alone,  but  likewise  in  quality,  that 
is,  some  are  nobler,  better,  and  more  becoming  a 
man  than  others,  and  therefore  preferable  on  other 
grounds  than  those  of  mere  continuance  and  inten- 
sity. I  wish  to  show  that  the  more  pleasant 
pleasure  is  not  always  the  better  pleasure ;  that 
even  the  pleasure  which  is  more  durable,  and 
thereby  more  pleasant  in  the  long  run,  is  not  the 
better  of  the  two  simply  as  carrying  the  greater 
cutnulus  of  pleasure.  If  this  is  shown,  it  will  follow 
that  pleasure  is  not  identical  with  good ;  or  that 
pleasure  is  not  happiness,  not  the  last  end  of  man. 

4.  Delight  comes  of  activity,  not  necessarily  oi 
change,  except  so  far  as  activity  itself  involves 
change,  as  it  always  does  in  mortal  man.  Delight 
sits  upon  activity,  as  the  bloom  upon  youth.  Bloom 
is  the  natural  sign  of  maturity ;  and  the  delight 
that  we  come  to  take  in  doing  a  thing  shows  that 
we  are  at  least  beginning  to  do  it  well  :  our  activity 
is  approaching  perfection.  In  this  sense  it  is  said 
that  delight  perfects  activity.  As  the  activity,  so  will  be 
the  delight.  But  the  activity  will  be  as  the  power 
of  which  it  is  an  exercise.  Powers  like  in  kind 
will  s.upply  like  activities,  and  these  again  will  yield 
delights  alike  in  kind.  There  is  no  difference  of 
quality    in    such    delights,    they   differ   in   quantity 


UF  DELIUIIT.  57 


alone.  Thus  taste  and  smell  arc  two  senses: 
the  difference  between  them  can  hardly  be  called 
one  of  kind:  therefore  the  delights  of  smelling  and 
of  tasting  fall  under  one  category.  We  may  ex- 
change so  much  smell  for  an  equal  amount  of  taste  : 
it  is  a  mere  matter  of  quantity.  But  between  sight 
and  hearing  on  the  one  hand,  and  taste  and  smell 
and  touch  on  the  other,  there  is  a  wider  difference, 
due  to  the  fact  that  intellect  allies  itself  more 
readily  to  the  operation  of  the  two  former  senses, 

5.  Widest  of  all  differences  is  that  between  sense 
and  intellect.  To  explain  this  difference  in  full 
belongs  to  Ps3'chology.  Enough  to  say  here  that 
the  object  of  sense  is  always  particular,  bound  up 
in  circumstances  of  present  time  and  place,  as  this 
horse  :  while  the  object  of  intellect  is  universal,  as 
horse  simply.  The  human  intellect  never  works 
without  the  concurrence  either  of  sense  or  of  imagi- 
nation, which  is  as  it  were  sense  at  second  hand. 
As  pure  intellectual  operation  is  never  found  in  man, 
so  neither  is  pure  intellectual  delight,  like  that  of  an 
angel.  Still,  as  even  in  man  sense  and  intellect 
are  two  powers  dilTering  in  kind,  so  must  their 
operations  differ  in  kind,  and  the  delights  conse- 
quent upon  those  operations.  Therefore,  unless 
Paley  would  have  been  willing  to  allow  that  the 
rational  and  animal  parts  of  our  nature  differ  only 
as  more  and  less — which  is  tantamount  to  avowing 
that  man  is  but  a  magnified  brute — he  ought 
not  to  have  penned  his  celebrated  utterance,  that 
pleasures  differ  only  in  continuance  and  intensity  : 
be    should    have  admitted  that   they  diiTer  likewise 


5«  OP  PASSIONS. 


in  kind ;  or  in  other  words,  that  pleasures  differ  in 
quahty  as  well  as  in  quantity.  The  goodness  of  a 
pleasure,  then,  is  not  the  mere  amount  of  it.  To 
repeat  St.  Augustine's  refection  on  the  drunken 
Milanese  :  "  It  makes  a  difference  what  source  a 
man  draws  his  delight  from."  *  As  in  man  reason 
is  nobler  than  sense,  preferable,  and  a  better  good 
to  its  possessor — for  reason  it  is  that  makes  him 
man  and  raises  him  above  the  brute — so  the  use 
of  the  reason  and  the  delight  that  comes  thereof  is 
nobler,  preferable,  and  a  better  good  to  him  than 
the  pleasure  that  is  of  the  mere  operation  of  his 
animal  nature.  A  little  of  the  nobler  delight  out- 
weighs a  vast  volume  of  the  baser  :  not  that  the 
nobler  is  the  pleasanter,  but  because  it  is  the  nobler. 
Nor  can  it  be  pretended  that  the  nobler  prevails  as 
being  the  more  durable,  and  thereby  likely  to  prove 
the  pleasanter  in  the  long  run.  The  nobler  is  better 
at  the  time  and  in  itself,  because  it  is  the  more 
human  delight  and  characteristic  of  the  higher 
species.  I  have  but  to  add  that  what  is  better  in 
itself  is  not  better  under  all  circumstances.  The 
best  life  of  man  can  only  be  lived  at  intervals. 
The  lower  operations  and  the  delights  that  go  with 
them  have  a  medicinal  power  to  restore  the  vigour 
that  has  become  enfeebled  by  a  lengthened  exercise 
of  the  higher  faculties.  At  those  "  dead  points  " 
food  and  fiddling  are  better  than  philosophy. 

6.  This  medicinal  or  restorative  virtue  of  delight 
is  a  fact  to  bear  in  mind  in  debating  the  question 
how  far  it  is  right  to  act  for  the  pleasure  that  the 

•  Interest  unde  quis  gaudeat.  (S.  Aug.,  Confess.,  vi.,  6.) 


OF  DELIGHT  54 


action  gives.  It  is  certainly  wrong  to  act  for  mere 
animal  graiificaticn.  Such  gratification  is  a  stimulus 
to  us  to  do  that  which  makes  for  the  well-being  of 
our  nature  :  to  iling  away  all  intention  of  any  good 
other  than  the  delight  of  the  action,  is  to  mistake 
the  incentive  for  the  end  proposed.  But  this  is  a 
doctrine  easily  misunderstood.  An  example  may 
save  it  from  being  construed  too  rigidly.  Suppose  a 
man  has  a  vinery,  and  being  fond  of  fruit  he  goes 
there  occasionally,  and  eats,  not  for  hunger,  but 
as  he  says,  because  he  likes  grapes.  He  seems  to 
act  for  mere  pleasure :  yet  who  shall  be  stern 
enough  to  condemn  him,  so  that  he  exceed  not  in 
quantity?  If  he  returns  from  the  vinery  in  a  more 
amiable  and  charitable  mood,  more  satisfied  with 
Providence,  more  apt  to  converse  with  men  and  do 
his  work  in  the  commonwealth,  who  can  deny  that 
in  acting  in  view  of  these  ends,  at  least  implicitly, 
he  has  taken  lawful  means  to  a  proper  purpose  ? 
He  has  not  been  fed,  but  recreated :  he  has  not 
taken  nourishment,  but  medicine,  preventive  or 
remedial,  to  a  mind  diseased.  It  is  no  doubt  a 
sweet  and  agreeable  medicine :  this  very  agreeable- 
ness  makes  its  medical  virtue.  It  is  a  sweet  anti- 
dote to  the  bitterness  of  life.  But  though  a  man 
may  live  by  medicine,  he  does  not  live  for  it.  So 
no  man  by  rights  lives  for  pleasure.  The  pleasure 
that  a  man  finds  in  his  work  encourages  him  to 
go  on  with  it.  The  pleasure  that  a  man  finds  by 
turning  aside  to  what  is  not  work,  picks  him  up, 
rests  and  renovates  him,  that  he  may  go  forth  as 
from    a  wayside    inn,  or   divcrliculuin,  refreshed    to 


6o  OF  PASSIONS. 


resume  tlie  road  of  labour.  Hence  we  gather  the 
solution  of  the  question  as  to  the  lawfulness  of 
acting  for  pleasure.  If  a  man  does  a  thing  because 
it  is  pleasant,  and  takes  the  pleasure  as  an  incentive 
to  carry  on  his  labour,  or  as  a  remedy  to  enable 
him  to  resume  it,  he  acts  for  pleasure  rightly.  For 
this  it  is  not  necessary  that  he  should  expressly  think 
of  the  pleasure  as  being  helpful  to  labour:  it  is 
enough  that  he  accepts  the  subordination  of  pleasure 
to  work  as  nature  has  ordained  it ;  and  this  ordi- 
nance he  does  accept,  if  he  puts  forth  no  positive 
volition  the  other  way,  whether  expressly,  as  none 
but  a  wrong-headed  theologian  is  likely  to  do,  or 
virtually,  by  taking  his  pleasure  with  such  greedi- 
ness that  the  motion  of  his  will  is  all  spent  therein 
as  in  its  last  end  and  terminus,  so  that  the  pleasure 
ceases  to  be  referable  to  aught  beyond  itself,  a  case 
of  much  easier  occurrence.  Or  lastly,  the  natural 
subordination  of  pleasure  to  work  may  be  set  aside, 
defeated,  and  rendered  impossible  by  the  whole 
tenour  of  an  individual's  life,  if  he  be  one  of  those 
giddy  butterflies  who  flit  from  pleasure  to  pleasure 
and  do  no  work  at  all.  Till  late  in  the  morning  he 
sleeps,  then  breakfasts,  then  he  shoots,  lunches, 
rides,  bathes,  dines,  listens  to  music,  smokes,  and 
reads  fiction  till  late  at  night,  then  sleeps  again ; 
and  this,  or  the  like  of  this  is  his  day,  some  three 
hundred  days  at  least  in  the  year.  This  is  not 
mere  acting  for  pleasure,  it  is  living  for  pleasure, 
or  acting  for  pleasure  so  continuously  as  to  leave 
no  scope  for  any  further  end  of  life.  It  may  be 
hard  to  indicate    the  precise  hour    in    which    this 


OF  ANGER.  6i 

man's  pleasure-seeking  passes  into  sin  :  still  this  is 
clear,  his  life  is  not  innocent.  Clear  him  of  gluttony 
and  lust,  there  remains  upon  him  the  sin  of  sloth 
and  of  a  wasted  existence. 

7.  Even  the  very  highest  of  delights,  the  delight 
of  contemplation,  is  not  the  highest  of  goods,  but 
a  concomitant  of  the  higliest  good.  The  highest 
good  is  the  final  object  of  the  will :  but  the  object 
of  the  will  is  not  the  will's  own  act :  we  do  not  will 
willing,  as  neither  do  we  understand  understanding, 
not  at  least  without  a  reflex  effort.  What  we  will 
in  contemplating  is,  not  to  be  delighted,  but  to 
see.  This  is  the  subjective  end  and  happiness  of 
man,  to  see,  to  contemplate.  Delight  is  not  any- 
thing objective  :  neither  is  it  the  subjective  last  end 
of  humanity.  In  no  sense  then  is  delight,  or 
pleasure,  the  highest  good. 

Readings. — AT.,Eth.,  X.,  iv.,  8  ;  ih.,  X.,  iii.,  8 — 13, 
ib.,  X.,  v.,  1—5  ;  Plato,  Corgias,  pp.  494,  495  ;  iMill, 
Utilitarianism,  2nd.  edit.,  pp.  11 — 16;  St.  Thos.,  la 
2ae,  q.  31,  art.  5  ;  id..  Contra  Gentiles,  iii.,  26,  nn.  8, 
10,  TI,  12. 

Section   I\'. — Of  Anger. 

I.  Anger  is  a  compound  passion,  made  up  of 
displeasure,  desire,  and  hope :  displeasure  at  a 
slight  received,  desire  of  revenge  and  satisfaction, 
and  hope  of  getting  the  same,  the  getting  of  it  being 
a  matter  of  some  difficulty  and  calling  for  some 
exertion,  for  we  are  not  angry  with  one  who  lies 
wholly  in  our  power,  or  whom  we  despise.  Anger  then 
ir<  conversant  at  once  with  the  gbod  of  vengeance 


Gz  OF  PASSIONS. 


and  with  the  evil  of  a  sHght  received  :  the  good 
being  somewhat  difficult  to  compass,  and  the  evil 
not  altogether  easy  to  wipe  out.  (Cf.  s.  i.,  n.  4,  p.  43.) 
2.  Anger  is  defined  :  A  desire  of  open  vengeance 
for  an  open  slight,  attended  with  displeasure  at  the  same, 
the  slight  being  put  upon  self,  or  tipon  some  dear  one, 
unbefittingly.  The  vengeance  that  the  angry  man 
craves  is  a  vengeance  that  all  shall  see.  "  No,  ye 
unnatural  hags,"  cries  Lear  in  his  fury,  "  I  will  do 
such  things, — what  they  shall  be  yet  I  know  not, 
but  they  shall  be  the  terror  of  the  earth.'"  When  we 
are  angry,  we  talk  of  "  making  an  example  "  of  the 
offender.  The  idea  is  that,  as  all  the  world  has 
seen  us  slighted  and  set  at  naught,  so  all  the  world, 
witnessing  the  punishment  of  the  offending  party, 
may  take  to  heart  the  lesson  which  we  are  enforcing 
upon  him,  namely,  that  we  are  men  of  might  and 
importance  whom  none  should  despise.  Whoever 
is  angry,  is  angry  at  being  despised,  flouted  to  his 
face  and  set  at  naught,  either  in  his  own  person,  or 
in  the  person  of  one  whom  he  venerates  and  loves, 
or  in  some  cause  that  lies  near  to  his  heart.  Anger 
is  essentially  a  craving  for  vengeance  on  account  of 
a  wrong  done.  If  then  we  have  suffered,  but  think 
we  deserve  to  suffer,  we  are  not  angry.  If  we  have 
suffered  wrong,  but  the  wrong  seems  to  have  been 
done  in  ignorance,  or  in  the  heat  of  passion,  we  are 
not  angry,  or  we  are  not  so  very  angry.  "  If  he 
had  known  what  he  was  about,"  we  say,  or,  "  if  he 
had  been  in  his  right  mind,  he  could  not  have 
brought  himself  to  treat  me  so."  But  when  one 
has  done  us  cool  and  deliberate  wrong,  then  we  are 


Of    ANGER.  63 


anj^ry,  because  the  slight  is  most  considerable. 
There  is  an  appearance  of  our  claims  to  considera- 
tions having  been  weighed,  and  found  wanting. 
We  call  it,  "  a  cool  piece  of  impertinence,"  "  spiteful 
malevolence,"  and  the  like.  Any  other  motive  to 
which  the  wrong  is  traceable  on  the  part  of  the 
wrong-doer,  lessens  our  anger  against  him  :  but  the 
motive  of  contempt,  and  that  alone,  if  we  seem  to 
discover  it  in  him,  invariably  increases  it.  To  this 
all  other  points  are  reducible  that  move  our  anger, 
as  forgetfulness,  rudely  delivered  tidings  of  mis- 
fortune, a  face  of  mirth  looking  on  at  our  distress, 
or  getting  in  the  way  and  thwarting  our  purpose. 

3.  Anger  differs  from  hatred.  Hatred  is  a  chronic 
affection,  anger  an  acute  one.  Hatred  wishes  evil 
to  a  man  as  it  is  evil,  anger  as  it  is  just.  Anger 
wishes  evil  to  fall  on  its  object  in  the  sight  of  all 
men,  and  with  the  full  consciousness  of  the  sufferer: 
hatred  is  satisfied  with  even  a  secret  mischief,  and, 
so  that  the  evil  be  a  grievous  one,  does  not  much 
mind  whether  the  sufferer  be  conscious  of  it  or  no. 
Thus  an  angry  man  may  wish  to  see  him  who  has 
offended  brought  to  public  confession  and  shame  : 
but  a  hater  is  well  content  to  see  his  enemy  spending 
his  fortune  foolishly,  or  dead  drunk  in  a  ditch  on 
a  lonely  wayside.  The  man  in  anger  feels  grief  and 
annoyance,  not  so  the  hater.  At  a  certain  point  of 
suffering  anger  stops,  and  is  appeased  when  full 
satisfaction  seems  to  have  been  made :  but  an 
enemy  is  implacable  and  insatiate  in  his  desire  of 
your  harm.  St.  Augustine  in  his  Rule  to  his  brethren 
says  :  "  For  quarrels,  either  have  them  not,  or  end 


fv|  OF   HABITS    AND    VIRTUES. 

them  with  all  speed,  lest  anger  grow  to  hatred,  and 
of  a  mote  make  a  beam." 

4.  Anger,  Hke  vengeance,  is  then  only  a  safe 
course  to  enter  on,  when  it  proceeds  not  upon 
personal  but  upon  public  grounds.  And  even  by 
this  maxim  many  deceive  themselves. 

Readings. — Ar.,  Rhet.,  ii.,  2  ;  ib.,  4,  ad  fin.  ;  St. 
Thos.,  la  23d,  q.  46,  art.  2,  in  corp. ;  ib.,  q.  .16,  art.  3, 
in  corp.  ;  ib.,  <i.  46,  arl.  6  ;  ib.,  q.  47,  art.  2. 


.     CHAPTER  V. 

O!"    HABITS    AND    VIRTUES. 

Section  I. — Of  Habit. 

T.  A  habit  is  a  quality  difficult  to  change,  whereby 
an  agent  whose  nature  it  was  to  work  one  way  or  another 
indeterminately,  is  disposed  easily  and  readily  at  will  to 
follow  this  or  that  particidar  line  of  action.  Habit 
differs  from  disposition,  as  disposition  is  a  quality 
easily  changed.  Thus  one  in  a  good  humour  is  in 
a  disposition  to  be  kind.  Habit  is  a  part  of  character: 
disposition  is  a  passing  fit.  Again,  habit  differs 
h  ova  faculty ,  or  power:  as  power  enables  one  to  act; 
but  habit,  presupposing  povver,  renders  action  easy 
and  e.xpeditious,  and  reliable  to  come  at  call.  We 
have  a  power  to  move  our  limbs,  but  a  habit  to 
walk  or  ride  or  swim.  Habit  then  is  the  deter- 
minant of  power.  One  and  the  same  power  works 
well  or  ill,  but  not  one  and  the  same  habit. 


OF  HABIT.  65 


2.  A  power  that  has  only  one  way  of  working, 
set  and  fixed,  is  not  susceptible  of  habit.  Such 
powers  are  the  forces  of  inanimate  nature,  as  gravi- 
tation and  electricity.  A  thing  does  not  gravitate 
better  for  gravitating  often.  The  moon  does  not 
obey  the  earth  more  readily  to-day  than  she  did  in 
the  days  of  Ptolemy,  or  of  the  Chaldean  sages. 
Some  specious  claim  to  habit  might  be  set  up  on 
behalf  of  electricity  and  magnetism.  A  glass  rod 
rubbed  at  frequent  intervals  for  six  months,  is  a 
different  instrument  from  what  it  would  have  been, 
if  left  all  that  time  idle  in  a  drawer.  Then  there 
are  such  cases  as  the  gradual  magnetising  of  an  iron 
bar.  Still  we  cannot  speak  of  electrical  habits,  or 
magnetic  habits,  not  at  least  in  things  without  life, 
because  there  is  no  will  there  to  control  the  exercise 
of  the  quality.  As  well  might  we  speak  of  a  **  tumble- 
down "  habit  in  a  row  of  houses,  brought  on  by 
locomotives  running  underneath  their  foundations. 
It  is  but  a  case  of  an  accumulation  of  small  effects, 
inducing  gradually  a  new  molecular  arrangement, 
so  that  the  old  powers  act  under  new  material 
conditions.  But  habit  is  a  thing  of  life,  an  appur- 
tenance of  will,  not  of  course  independent  of  material 
conditions  and  structural  alterations,  in  so  far  forth 
as  a  living  and  volitional  is  also  a  material  agent, 
but  essentially  usable  at  will,  and  brought  into  play 
and  controlled  in  its  operation  by  free  choice. 
Therefore  a  habit  that  works  almost  automatically 
has  less  of  the  character  of  a  true  habit,  and  passes 
rather  out  of  morality  into  the  region  of  physics. 
Again,  bad  habits,  vices  to  which  a  man  is  become 


66  OF  HABITS  AND    VIRTUES. 

a  slave  against  his  better  judgment,  are  less  properly 
called  habits  than  virtues  are  ;  for  such  evil  habits 
do  not  so  much  attend  on  volition  (albeit  volition 
has  created  them)  as  drag  the  will  in  their  wake. 
For  the  like  reason,  habit  is  less  properly  predicable 
of  brute  animals  than  of  men  :  for  brutes  have  no 
intelligent  will  to  govern  their  habits.  The  highest 
brutes  are  most  susceptible  of  habit.  They  are 
most  like  men  in  being  most  educable.  And,  of 
human  progeny,  some  take  up  habits,  in  the  best 
and  completest  sense  of  the  term,  more  readily  than 
others.  They  are  better  subjects  for  education : 
education  being  nothing  else  than  the  formation  oJ 
habits. 

3.  Knowledge  consists  of  intellectual  habits. 
But  the  habits  of  most  consequence  to  the  moralist 
He  in  the  will,  and  in  the  sensitive  appetite  as 
amenable  to  the  control  of  the  will.  In  this 
category  come  the  virtues,  in  the  ordinary  sense 
of  that  name,  and  secondarily  the  vices. 

4.  A  habit  is  acquired  by  act-s.  Whereupon  this 
difficulty  has  been  started : — If  the  habit,  say  of 
mental  application,  comes  from  acts  of  study,  and 
again  the  acts  from  the  habit,  how  ever  is  the  habit 
originally  acquired  ?  We  answer  that  there  are  two 
ways  in  which  one  thing  may  come  from  another. 
It  may  come  in  point  of  its  very  existence,  as  child 
from  parent ;  or  in  point  of  some  mode  of  existence, 
as  scholar  from  master.  A  habit  has  its  very 
existence  from  acts  preceding :  but  those  acts  have 
their  existence  independent  of  the  habit.  The  acts 
which  are  elicited  after  the  habit  is  formed,  owe  tp 


OF  HABIT.  87 


the  habit,  not  their  existence,  but  the  mode  of  their 
existence :  that  is  to  say,  because  of  the  habit  the 
acts  are  now  formed  readily,  reHably,  and  artis- 
tically, or  virtuously.  The  primitive  acts  which 
gradually  engendered  the  habit,  were  done  with 
difficulty,  fitfully,  and  with  many  failures, — more  by 
good  luck  than  good  management,  if  it  was  a  matter 
of  skill,  and  by  a  special  effort  rather  than  as  a  thing 
of  course,  where  it  was  question  of  moral  well-doing. 
(See  c.  ii.,  s.  ii.,  n.  g,  p.  10.) 

5.  A  habit  is  a  living  thing:  it  grows  and  must 
be  fed.  It  grows  on  acts,  and  acts  are  the  food 
that  sustain  it.  Unexercised,  a  habit  pines  away : 
corruption  sets  in  and  disintegration.  A  man,  we 
will  say,  has  a  habit  of  thinking  of  God  during  his 
work.  He  gives  over  doing  so.  That  means  that  he 
either  takes  to  thinking  of  everything  and  nothing, 
or  he  takes  up  some  definite  line  of  thought  to  the 
exclusion  of  God.  Either  way  there  is  a  new 
formation  to  the  gradual  ruin  of  the  old  habit. 

6.  Habit  and  custom  may  be  distinguished  in 
philosophical  language.  We  may  say  that  custom 
makes  the  habit.  Custom  does  not  imply  any  skill 
or  special  facility.  A  habit  is  a  channel  whereby 
the  energies  flow,  as  otherwise  they  would  not  have 
flowed,  freely  and  readily  in  some  particular  direction. 
A  habit,  then,  is  a  determination  of  a  faculty  for 
good  or  for  evil.  It  is  something  intrinsic  in  a 
man,  a  real  modification  of  his  being,  abiding  in 
him  in  the  intervals  between  one  occasion  for  its 
exercise  and  another  :  whereas  custom  is  a  mere 
denomination,  expressive  of  frequent  action  and  no 


68  OF  HABITS  AND    VIRTUES. 

more.  Thus  it  would  be  more  philosophical  to 
speak  of  a  custom  of  early  rising,  and  of  a  custom 
of  smoking,  rather  than  of  a  habit  of  smoking, 
except  so  far  as,  by  the  use  of  the  word  habit,  you 
may  wish  to  point  to  a  certain  acquired  skill  of 
the  respiratory  and  facial  muscles,  and  a  certain 
acquired  temper  of  the  stomach,  enabling  one  to 
inhale  tobacco  fumes  with  impunity. 

7.  Habits  are  acquired,  but  it  is  obvious  that  the 
rate  of  acquisition  varies  in  difl'erent  persons.  This 
comes  from  one  person  being  more  predisposed  by 
nature  than  another  to  the  acquiring  of  this  or  that 
habit.  By  nature,  that  is  by  the  native  temper  and 
conformation  of  his  body  wherewith  he  was  born, 
this  child  is  more  prone  to  literary  learning,  that  to 
mechanics,  this  one  to  obstinacy  and  contentious- 
ness, that  to  sensuality,  and  so  of  the  rest.  For 
though  it  is  by  the  soul  that  a  man  learns,  and  by 
the  act  of  his  will  and  spiritual  powers  he  becomes 
a  glutton  or  a  2ealot,  nevertheless  the  bodily  organs 
concur  and  act  jointly  towards  these  ends.  The 
native  dispositions  of  the  child's  body  for  the 
acquisition  of  habits  depend  to  an  unascertained 
extent  upon  the  habits  of  his  ancestors.  This  is 
the  fact  of  heredity. 

8.  Man  is  said  to  be  **  a  creature  of  habits." 
The  formation  of  habits  in  the  will  saves  the 
necessity  of  continually  making  up  the  mind  anew. 
A  man  will  act  as  he  has  become  habituated,  except 
under  some  special  motive  from  without,  or  some 
special  effort  from  within.  In  the  case  of  evil  habits, 
that  effort  is  attended  with  immense  difficulty.     The 


OF    VIRTUES  IN   GENERAL. 


habit  is  indeed  the  man's  own  creation,  the  outcome 
of  his  free  acts.  But  he  is  become  the  bondslave  of 
his  creature,  so  much  so  that  when  the  occasion 
arrives,  three-fourths  of  the  act  is  already  done,  by 
the  force  of  the  habit  alone,  before  his  will  is 
awakened,  or  drowsily  moves  in  its  sleep.  The 
only  way  for  the  will  to  free  itself  here  is  not  to  wait 
for  the  occasion  to  come,  but  be  astir  betimes,  keep 
the  occasion  at  arm's  length,  and  register  many  a 
determination  and  firm  protest  and  fervent  prayer 
against  the  habit.  He  who  neglects  to  do  this  in 
the  interval  has  himself  to  blame  for  being  overcome 
every  time  that  he  falls  upon  the  occasion  which 
brings  into  play  the  evil  habit. 

Readings. — St.  Thos.,  la  2se,  q.  49,  art.  4,  ad  i,  2  ; 
ib.,  q.  50,  art.  3,  in  corp.,  ad.  i,  2;  ib.,  q.  51,  art.  i, 
in  corp. ;  ib.,  q.  53,  art.  3,  in  corp. ;  Ar.,  Eth.,  II.,  i. ; 
ib.f  III.,  v.,  10 — 14;  z7^,  II.,  iv.,  I,  2,  4. 

Section  II. — Of  Viiiues  in  General. 

I.  Virtue  in  its  most  transcendental  sense  means 
the  excellence  of  a  thing  according  to  its  kind. 
Thus  it  is  the  virtue  of  the  eye  to  see,  and  of  a 
horse  to  be  fleet  of  foot.  Vice  is  a.  flaw  in  the  make 
of  a  thing,  going  to  render  it  useless  for  the  purpose 
to  which  it  was  ordained.  From  the  ethical  stand- 
point, virtue  is  a  habit  that  a  man  has  got  of  doing 
moral  good,  or  doing  that  which  it  befits  his  rational 
nature  to  do :  and  vice  is  a  habit  of  doing  moral 
evil.  (See  c.  i.,  n.  5.)  It  is  important  to  observe  that 
virtue  and  vice  arc  not  acts  but  habits.  Vices  do 
not  make  a  man  guilty,  uor  do  virtues  make  him 


yc  OF  HABITS   AND    VIRTUES 

innocent.  A  man  is  guilty  or  innocent  according  to 
his  acts,  not  according  to  his  habits.  A  man  may 
do  a  wicked  thing  and  not  be  vicious,  or  a  good 
action  and  not  be  virtuous.  But  no  man  is  vicious 
who  has  not  done  one,  two,  aye,  many  wicked 
things :  and  to  be  virtuous,  a  man  must  have 
performed  many  acts  of  virtue.  Children  do  right 
and  wrong,  but  they  have  neither  virtues  nor  vices 
except  in  a  nascent  state :  there  has  not  yet  been 
time  in  them  for  the  habits  to  be  formed.  When 
sin  is  taken  away  by  God  and  pardoned,  the  vice, 
that  is,  the  evil  habit,  if  any  such  existed  before,  still 
remains,  and  constitutes  a  danger  for  the  future. 
The  habit  can  only  be  overcome  by  watchfulness 
and  a  long  continuance  of  contrary  acts.  But  vice 
is  Dot  sin,  nor  is  sin  vice,  nor  a  good  deed  a  virtue, 

2.  The  name  of  virtue  is  given  to  certain  habits 
residing  in  the  intellect,  as  intuition  or  insight  (into 
self-evident  truths),  wisdom  (regarding  conclusions 
of  main  application),  science  (of  conclusions  in  special 
departments),  and  art.  These  are  called  intellectual 
virtues. 

It  was  a  peculiarity  of  Socrates'  teaching,  largely 
shared  by  Plato,  to  make  all  virtue  intellectual,  a 
doctrine  expressed  in  the  formula.  Virtue  is  know- 
ledge ;  which  is  tantamount  to  this  other,  Vice  is 
ignorance,  or  an  erroneous  view.  From  whence  the 
conclusion  is  inevitable  :  No  evil  deed  is  wilfully  done  ; 
and  therefore,  No  man  is  to  blame  for  being  wicked. 

3.  Undoubtedly  there  is  a  certain  element  of 
ignorance  in  all  vice,  and  a  certain  absence  of 
will  about  every  vicious  act.     There  is  likewise  an 


OF    VIRTUES   IN  GENERAL. 


intellectual  side  to  all  virtue.  These  positions  we 
willingly  concede  to  the  Socratics.  Every  morally 
evil  act  is  borne  of  some  voluntary  inconsiderateness. 
The  agent  is  looking  the  wrong  way  in  the  instaiit 
at  which  he  does  wrong.  Either  he  is  regarding 
only  the  solicitations  of  his  inferior  nature  to  the 
neglect  of  the  superior,  or  he  is  considering  some 
rational  good  indeed,  but  a  rational  good  which,  if 
he  would  look  steadily  upon  it,  he  would  perceive 
to  be  unbefitting  for  him  to  choose.  No  man  can 
do  evil  in  the  very  instant  in  which  his  under- 
standing is  considering,  above  all  things  else,  that 
which  it  behoves  him  specially  to  consider  in  the 
case.  Again,  in  every  wrong  act,  it  is  not  the  sheer 
evil  that  is  willed,  but  the  good  through  or  with  the 
evil.  Good,  real  or  supposed,  is  sought  for :  evil  is 
accepted  as  leading  to  good  in  the  way  of  means,  or 
annexed  thereto  as  a  circumstance.  Moreover,  no 
act  is  virtuous  that  is  elicited  quite  mechanically,  or 
at  the  blind  instance  of  passion.  To  be  virtuous, 
the  thing  must  be  done  on  principle,  that  is,  at  the 
dictate  of  reason  and  by  the  light  of  intellect. 

4.  Still,  virtue  is  not  knowledge.  There  are 
other  than  intellectual  habits  needed  to  complete 
the  character  of  a  virtuous  man.  *'  I  see  the  better 
course  and  approve  it,  and  follow  the  worse,"  said 
the  Roman  poet.*  "  The  evil  which  I  will  not,  that 
I  do,"  said  the  Apostle.  It  is  not  enough  to  have 
an   intellectual    discernment  of  and   preference  for 


•  Video  raeliora  proboque, 
Deteriora  sequor. 

(Ovid,  Metamorph.,  vii..  21  ) 


73  OF  HABITS  AND    VIRTUES. 

what  is  right :  but  the  will  must  be  habituated  to 
embrace  it,  and  the  passions  too  must  be  habituated 
to  submit  and  square  themselves  to  right  being  done. 
In  other  words,  a  virtuous  man  is  made  up  by  the 
union  of  enlightened  intellect  with  the  moral  virtues. 
The  addition  is  necessary  for  several  reasons. 

(a)  Ordinarily,  the  intellect  does  not  necessitate 
the  will.  The  will,  then,  needs  to  be  clamped  and 
set  by  habit  to  choose  the  right  thing  as  the  intellect 
proposes  it. 

(b.)  Intellect,  or  Reason,  is  not  absolute  in  the 
human  constitution.  As  Aristotle  (Pol.,  I.,  v.,  6) 
says :  "  The  soul  rules  the  body  with  a  despotic 
command :  but  reason  rules  appetite  with  a  com- 
mand constitutional  and  kingly  "  :  that  is  to  say,  as 
Aristotle  elsewhere  {Eth.,  I.,  xiii.,  15,  16)  explains, 
passion  often  "  fights  and  resists  reason,  opposes 
and  contradicts  "  :  it  has  therefore  to  be  bound  by 
ordinances  and  institutions  to  follow  reason's  lead : 
these  institutions  are  good  habits,  moral  virtues, 
resident  there  where  passion  itself  is  resident,  in  the 
inferior  appetite.  It  is  not  enough  that  the  rider  is 
competent,  but  the  horse  too  must  be  broken  in. 

(c.)  It  is  a  saying,  that  "  no  mortal  is  always 
wise."  There  are  times  when  reason's  utterance  is 
faint  from  weariness  and  vexation.  Then,  unless 
a  man  has  acquired  an  almost  mechanical  habit 
of  obeying  reason  in  the  conduct  of  his  will  and 
passions,  he  wall  in  such  a  conjuncture  act  incon- 
siderately and  do  wrong.  That  habit  is  moral 
virtue.  Moral  virtue  is  as  the  fly-wheel  of  an 
engine,  a  reservoir  of  force  to  carry  the  machine 


VIRTUES   INTELLECTUAL   AND   MORAL.  73 

past  the  "dead  points"  in  its  working.  Or  again, 
moral  virtue  is  as  discipline  to  troops  suddenly 
attacked,  or  hard  pressed  in  the  fight. 

5.  Therefore,  besides  the  habits  in  the  intellect 
that  bear  the  name  of  intellectual  virtues,  the  virtuous 
man  must  possess  other  habits,  as  well  in  the  will, 
that  this  power  may  readily  embrace  what  the 
understanding  points  out  to  be  good,  as  in  the 
sensitive  appetite  in  both  its  parts,  concupiscible 
and  irascible,  so  far  forth  as  appetite  is  amenable 
to  the  control  of  the  will,  that  it  may  be  so  con- 
trolled and  promptly  obey  the  better  guidance. 
These  habits  in  the  will  and  in  the  sensitive  appetite 
are  called  moral  virtues,  and  to  them  the  name  of 
virtue  is  usually  confined. 

Readings. — St.  Thos.,  la  2£e,  q.  71,  art.  i,  incorp.; 
ib.,  q.  58,  art.  2;  ib.,  q.  58,  art.  3,  in  corp.,  ad  3;  ib., 
q.  56,  art.  4,  in  corp.,  ad  i — 3. 

Section  III. — Of  the  Difference  between  Virtues  Intellectual 

atid  Moral. 

I.  St.  Thomas*  (la  2se,  q.  56,  art.  3,  in  corp.) 
draws  this  difference,  that  an  intellectual  virtue 
gives  one  a  facility  in  doing  a  good  act  ;  but  a 
moral  virtue  not  only  gives  facility,  but  makes  one 
put  the  facility  in  use.     Thus  a  habit  of  grammar 

*  By  doing  good  St.  Thomas  means  the  determination  of  the 
appetite,  rational  or  sensitive,  to  good.  He  says  that  intellectual 
virtue  does  not  prompt  this  determination  of  the  appetite.  Of 
course  it  does  not :  it  prompts  only  the  act  of  the  power  wherein  it 
resides :  now  it  resides  in  the  intellect,  not  in  the  appetite ;  and  it 
prompts  the  act  of  the  intellect,  which  however  is  not  always 
followed  by  an  act  of  appetite  in  accordance  with  it. 


74  OF  HABITS   AND    VIRTUES. 

he  says,  enables  one  readily  to  speak  correctly,  but 
does  not  ensure  that  one  always  shall  speak  cor- 
rectly, for  a  grammarian  may  make  solecisms  on 
purpose  :  whereas  a  habit  of  justice  not  only  makes 
a  man  prompt  and  ready  to  do  just  deeds,  but 
makes  him  actually  do  them.  Not  that  any  habit 
necessitates  volition.  Habits  do  not  necessitate, 
but  they  facilitate  the  act  of  the  will.  (s.  i.,  nn.  i, 
2,  8,  pp.  64,  68.) 

2.  Another  distinction  may  be  gathered  from 
St.  Thomas  (la  2as,  q.  21,  art.  2,  ad  2),  that  the  special 
intellectual  habit  called  art  disposes  a  man  to  act 
correctly  towards  some  particular  end,  but  a  moral 
habit  towards  the  common  end,  scope  and  purpose 
of  all  human  life.  Thus  medical  skill  ministers  to 
the  particular  end  of  healing  :  while  the  moral  habit 
of  temperance  serves  the  general  end,  which  is  final 
happiness  and  perfection.  So  to  give  a  wrong 
prescription  through  sheer  antecedent  ignorance,  is 
to  fail  as  a  doctor  :  but  to  get  drunk  wittingly  and 
knowingly  is  to  fail  as  a  man. 

3.  The  grand  distinction  between  intellectual 
and  moral  habits  seems  to  be  this,  that  moral  habits 
reside  in  powers  which  may  act  against  the  dictate 
of  the  understanding, — the  error  of  Socrates,  noticed 
above  (c.  v.,  s.  ii.,  n.  2,  p.  70),  lay  in  supposing  that 
they  could  not  so  act :  whereas  the  power  which  is 
the  seat  of  the  intellectual  habits,  the  understanding, 
cannot  possibly  act  against  itself.  Habits  dispose 
the  subject  to  elicit  acts  of  the  power  wherein  they 
reside.  Moral  habits  induce  acts  of  will  and  sen- 
sitive appetite  :  intellectual  habits,  acts  of  intellect. 


VIRTUES  imELLECTUAL   AND   MORAL.  75 

Will  and  appetite  may  act  against  what  the  agent 
knows  to  be  best :  but  intellect  cannot  contradict 
intellect.  It  cannot  judge  that  to  be  true  and 
beautiful  which  it  knows  to  be  false  and  foul. 
If  a  musician  strikes  discords  on  purpose,  or  a  gram- 
marian makes  solecisms  wilfully,  he  is  not  therein 
contradicting  the  intellectual  habit  within  him,  for 
it  is  the  office  of  such  a  habit  to  aid  the  intellect  to 
judge  correctly,  and  the  intellect  here  does  correctly 
judge  the  effect  produced.  On  the  other  hand,  if 
the  musician  or  grammarian  blunders,  the  intellect 
within  him  has  not  been  contradicted,  seeing  that 
he  knew  no  better  :  the  habit  of  grammar  or  music 
has  not  been  violated,  but  has  failed  to  cover  the 
case.  Therefore  the  intellectual  habit  is  not  a  safe- 
guard to  keep  a  man  from  going  against  his  in- 
telligent self.  No  such  safeguard  is  needed :  the 
thing  is  impossible,  in  the  region  of  pure  intellect. 
In  a  region  where  no  temptation  could  enter,  in- 
tellectual habits  would  suffice  alone  of  themselves  to 
make  a  perfectly  virtuous  man.  To  avoid  evil  and 
choose  good,  it  would  be  enough  to  know  the  one 
and  the  other.  But  in  this  world  seductive  reason- 
ings sway  the  will,  and  fits  of  passion  the  sensitive 
appetite,  prompting  the  one  and  the  other  to  rise  up 
and  break  awav  from  what  the  intellect  knows  all 
along  to  be  the  true  good  of  man.  Unless  moral 
virtue  be  there  to  hold  these  powers  to  their 
allegiance,  they  will  frequently  disobey  the  under- 
standing. Such  disobedience  is  more  irrational 
than  any  mere  intellectual  error.  In  an  error 
purely  intellectual,  where  the  will  has  no  part,  the 


76  OF  HABITS    AND    VIRTUES. 

objective  truth  indeed  is  missed,  but  the  intelh'gence 
that  dwells  within  the  man  is  not  flouted  and  gain- 
saved.  It  takes  two  to  make  a  contradiction  as  to 
make  a  quarrel.  But  an  intellectual  error  has  only 
one  side.  The  intellect  utters  some  false  pronounce- 
ment, and  there  is  nothing  within  the  man  that  says 
otherwise.  In  the  moral  error  there  is  a  contra- 
diction within,  an  intestine  quarrel.  The  intellect 
pronounces  a  thing  not  good,  not  to  be  taken,  and 
the  sensitive  appetite  will  throw  a  veil  over  the  face 
of  intellect,  and  seize  upon  the  thing.  That  amounts 
to  a  contradiction  of  a  man's  own  intelligent  self. 

4.  It  appears  that,  absolutely  speaking,  intel- 
lectual virtue  is  the  greater  perfection  of  a  man  : 
indeed  in  the  act  of  that  virtue,  as  we  have  seen,  his 
crowning  perfection  and  happiness  lies.  But  moral 
virtue  is  the  greater  safeguard.  The  breach  of 
moral  virtue  is  the  direr  evil.  Sin  is  worse  than 
ignorance,  and  more  against  reason,  because  it  is 
against  the  doer's  own  reason.  Moral  virtue  then 
is  more  necessary  than  intellectual  in  a  world  where 
evil  is  rife,  as  it  is  a  more  vital  thing  to  escape 
grievous  disease  than  to  attain  the  highest  develop- 
ment of  strength  and  beauty.  And  as  disease  spoils 
strength  and  beauty,  not  indeed  always  taking  them 
away,  but  rendering  them  valueless,  so  evil  moral 
habits  subvert  intellectual  virtue,  and  turn  it  aside 
in  a  wrong  direction.  The  vicious  will  keeps  the 
intellect  from  contemplating  the  objects  which  are 
the  best  good  of  man :  so  the  contemplation  is 
thrown  away  on  inferior  things,  often  on  base 
things,  and  an  overgrowth  of  folly  ensues  on  those 


OF  THE  MEAN   IN   MORAL    VIRTUE.  77 

points  whereupon  it  most  imports  a  man  to  be 
wise. 

To  sum  up  all  in  a  sentence,  not  exclusive  but 
dealing  with  characteristics :  the  moral  virtues  are  the 
virtties  for  this  world,  intellectual  virtue  is  the  virtue  oj 
the  life  to  come. 

Readings. — St.  Thos.,  la  23e,  q.  58,  art.  2,  in 
corp. ;  Ar.,  Eth.,  I.,  xiii.,  15 — 19  ;  St.  Thos.,  la  2ae, 
q.  66,  art.  3. 

Section  IV. — Of  the  Mean  in  Moral  Viritte. 

I.  Moral  virtue  is  a  habit  of  doing  the  right  thing 
in  the  conduct  of  the  will  and  the  government  of 
the  passions.  Doing  right  is  opposed  to  overdoing 
the  thing,  and  to  underdoing  it.  Doing  right  is 
taking  what  it  suits  a  rational  nature  to  desire,  and 
eschewing  what  is  unsuitable  under  the  circum- 
stances, (c.  i.,  n.  5.) 

But  a  thing  may  be  unsuitable  in  two  ways,  by 
excess,  and  by  defect :  the  rational  choice  is  in  the 
mean  between  these  two.  The  moral  order  here  is 
illustrated  from  the  physical.  Too  much  exercise 
and  too  little  alike  impair  the  strength ;  so  of  meat 
and  drink  in  regard  to  health  ;  but  diet  and  exercise 
in  moderation,  and  in  proportion  to  the  subject, 
create,  increase,  and  preserve  both  health  and 
strength.  So  it  is  with  temperance,  and  fortitude, 
and  all  varieties  of  moral  virtue.  He  who  fights 
shy  of  everything,  and  never  stands  his  ground, 
becomes  a  coward  ;  while  he  who  never  fears  at  all, 
but  walks  boldly  up  to  all  danger,  turns  out  rash. 
The  enjoyer  of  every  pleasure,  who  knows  not  what 


78  OF  HABITS   AND    VIRTUES. 

« 

it  is  to  deny  himself  aught,  is  a  Hbertine  and  loose 
liver ;  while  to  throw  over  all  the  graces  and  deli- 
cious things  of  life,  not  as  St.  Paul  did,  who  counted 
all  things  dross,  that  he  might  gain  Christ,  but 
absolutely,  as  though  such  things  were  of  themselves 
devoid  of  attraction,  is  boorishness  and  insensibility. 
Thus  the  virtues  of  temperance  and  fortitude  perish 
in  excess  and  defect,  and  live  in  the  mean.  It  is  to 
be  noticed  in  this  illustration  that  the  mean  of 
health  is  not  necessarily  the  mean  of  virtue. 
What  is  too  little  food,  and  too  much  exercise,  for 
the  animal  well-being  of  a  man,  may  be  the  right 
amount  of  both  for  him  in  some  higher  relation, 
inasmuch  as  he  is  more  than  a  mere  animal ;  as  for 
a  soldier  in  a  hard  campaign,  where  a  sufficiency  of 
food  and  rest  is  incompatible  with  his  serving  his 
country's  need. 

2.  The  taking  of  means  to  an  end  implies  the 
taking  them  in  moderation,  not  in  excess,  or  we 
shall  overshoot  the  mark,  nor  again  so  feebly  and 
inadequately  as  to  fall  short  of  it.  No  mere  instru- 
ment admits  of  an  unlimited  use  ;  but  the  end  to  be 
gained  fixes  limits  to  the  use  of  the  instrument,  thus 
far,  no  more,  and  no  less.  Wherever  then  reason 
requires  an  end  to  be  gained,  it  requires  a  use  of 
means  proportionate  to  the  end,  not  coming  short 
of  it,  nor  going  so  far  beyond  as  to  defeat  the 
purpose  in  view.  The  variety  of  good  that  is  called 
the  Useful  lies  within  definite  limits,  between  two 
wildernesses,  so  to  speak,  stretching  out  undefined 
into  the  distance,  wilderness  of  Excess  on  the  one 
side,  and  wilderness  of  Defect  on  the  other. 


OF  THE   MEAN   IN   MORAL    VIRTUE.  79 

3.  A  true  work  of  art  cannot  be  added  to  or 
taken  from  without  spoiling  it.  A  perfect  church 
would  be  spoiled  by  a  lengthening  of  the  chancel  or 
raising  the  tower,  albeit  there  are  buildings,  secular 
and  ecclesiastical,  that  might  be  drawn  out  two 
miles  long  and  not  look  any  worse.  The  colouring 
of  a  picture  must  not  be  too  violent  and  positive ; 
but  artistic  colouring  must  be  chaste,  and  artistic 
utterance  gentle,  and  artistic  action  calm  and  indi- 
cative of  self-command.  Not  that  voice  and  action 
should  not  be  impassioned  for  a  great  emergency, 
but  the  very  passion  should  bear  the  mark  of  con- 
trol :  in  the  great  master's  phrase,  you  must  not 
"  tear  a  passion  to  tatters."  It  is  by  moderation 
sitting  upon  power  that  works  of  art  truly  masculine 
and  mighty  are  produced  ;  and  by  this  sign  they  are 
marked  off  from  the  lower  host  of  things,  gorgeous 
and  redundant,  and  still  more  from  the  order  of 
"  the  loose,  the  lawless,  the  exaggerated,  the  inso- 
lent, and  the  profane." 

4.  On  these  considerations  Aristotle  framed  his 
celebrated  definition  of  moral  virtue  :  the  habit  oj 
fixing  the  choice  in  the  golden  mean  in  relation  to  our- 
selves, defined  by  reason,  as  a  prudent  man  would  define 
it.  All  virtue  is  a  habit,  as  we  have  seen — a  habit 
of  doing  that  which  is  the  proper  act  of  the  power 
wherein  the  habit  resides.  One  class  of  moral 
virtues  is  resident  in  the  will,  the  act  of  which  power 
is  properly  called  choice.  The  rest  of  the  moral 
virtues  reside  in  the  sensitive  appetite,  which  also 
may  be  said  to  choose  that  object  on  which  it  fastens. 
Thus  moral  virtue  is  a  habit  oi  fixing  the  choice.     The 


8o  OF  HABITS   AND    VIRTUES. 

golden  mean  between  two  extremes  of  excess  and 
defect  respectively  has  been  already  explained,  and 
may  be  further  shown  by  a  review  of  the  virtues. 
Besides  fortitude  and  temperance,  already  described, 
liberality  is  a  mean  between  prodigality  and  stingi- 
ness ;  magnificence  between  vulgar  display  and  petti- 
ness :  magnanimity  between  vainglory  and  pusillan- 
imity ;  truthfulness  between  exaggeration  and  dis- 
simulation ;  friendship  between  complaisance,  or 
flattery,  and  frowardness, — and  so  of  the  rest.  The 
golden  mean  must  be  taken  in  relation  to  ourselves, 
because  in  many  matters  of  behaviour  and  the 
management  of  the  passions  the  right  amount  for 
one  person  would  be  excessive  for  another,  according 
to  varieties  of  age,  sex,  station,  and  disposition. 
Thus  anger  that  might  become  a  layman  might  be 
unbefitting  in  a  churchman  ;  and  a  man  might  be 
t.hought  loquacious  if  he  talked  as  much  as  a  dis- 
creet matron.*  The  golden  mean,  then,  must  be 
defined  by  reason  according  to  the  particular  circum-^ 
stances  of  each  case.  But  as  Reason  herself  is  to 
seek  where  she  is  not  guided  by  Prudence,  the  mean 
of  virtue  must  be  defined,  not  by  the  reason  of  the 
buffoon  Pantolabus,  or  of  Nomentanus  the  spend- 
thrift, but  as  a  pnidetit  man  would  define  it,  given  an 
insight  into  the  case. 

5.  The  "  golden  mean,"  as  Horace  named  it 
{Od.,  {[.,  10),  obtains  principally,  if  not  solely,  in 
living  things,  and  in  what  appertains  to  living  things, 
and  in  objects  of  art.     A  lake,  as  such,  has  no  natural 

•  Ar.,  Pol.,  III.,  iv.,  17,  says  just  the  converse,  which  marks  the 
altered  position  of  woman  in  modern  society. 


OF  THE   MEAN   IN   MORAL    VIRTUE.  8l 

dimensions :  it  may  be  ten  miles  lon^,  it  may  be  a 
hundred  ;  but  an  elephant  or  an  oak-tree  cannot  go 
beyond  a  certain  growth.  There  is  a  vast  range 
between  the  temperature  of  a  blast-furnace  and  the 
temperature  of  the  ice-pack  on  the  Polar  Sea,  but 
very  limited  is  the  range  possible  in  the  blood  of  a 
living  man.  Viewed  artistically,  a  hill  may  be  too 
low,  or  a  lake  want  width,  for  man's  eye  to  rest 
upon  it  with  perfect  satisfaction.  The  golden  mean, 
then,  is  an  artistic  conception,  and  what  I  may  call 
an  anthropological  conception  :  it  suits  man,  and  is 
required  by  man,  though  Nature  may  spurn  and 
9ver-ride  it.  The  earthquake,  the  hurricane,  and 
the  angry  ocean  are  not  in  the  golden  mean,  not  at 
least  from  a  human  point  of  view.  If  man  chooses 
to  personify  and  body  forth  the  powers  of  nature, 
he  creates  some  monstrous  uncouth  figure,  like  the 
Assyrian  and  Egyptian  idols ;  but  if  man  makes  a 
study  of  man,  and  brings  genius  and  patient  elabora- 
tion to  bear  on  his  work,  there  emerges  the  symmetry 
and  perfect  proportion  of  the  Greek  statue.  No 
people  ever  made  so  much  of  the  beauty  of  the 
human  form  as  the  ancient  Greeks  :  they  made  it 
the  object  of  a  passion  that  marked  their  religion, 
their  institutions,  their  literature,  and  their  art. 
Their  virtues  and  their  vices  turned  upon  it.  Hence 
the  golden  mean  is  eminently  a  Greek  conception, 
a  leading  idea  of  the  Hellenic  race.  The  Greek 
hated  a  thing  overdone,  a  gaudy  ornament,  a  proud 
title,  a  fulsome  compliment,  a  high-flown  speech,  a 
wordy  peroration.  Nothing  too  much  was  the  in- 
scription over  the  lintel  of  the  national  sanctuary 
9 


8a  OF   HABITS  AND    VIRTUES. 


at  Delphi.  It  is  the  surpassing  grace  of  Greek  art 
of  the  best  period,  that  in  it  there  shines  out  the 
highest  power,  with  «o//n'«^  ^oo  wzmc/j  of  straining  after 
effect.  The  study  of  Greek  hterary  models  operates 
as  a  corrective  to  redundancy,  and  to  what  ill- 
conditioned  minds  take  to  be  fine  writing.  The 
Greek  artist  knew  just  how  far  to  go,  and  when  to 
stop.  That  point  he  called,  in  his  own  unsurpassed 
tongue,  the  Kaip6<i.  "The  right  measure  {Katposi)  is 
at  the  head  of  all,"  says  Pindar.  "  Booby,  not  to 
have  understood  b}'  how  much  the  half  is  more  than 
the  whole,"  is  the  quaint  cry  of  Hesiod.  ^Eschylus 
puts  these  verses  in  the  mouth  of  his  Furies  : 

The  golden  mean  is  God's  delight ; 
Extremes  are  hateful  in  His  sight. 
Hold  by  the  mean,  and  glorify 
Nor  anaichy  nor  slavery. 

Characteristic  of  Socrates  was  his  irony,  or  way 
of  understating  himself,  in  protest  against  the  extra- 
vagant professions  of  the  Sophists.  In  the  reckoning- 
of  the  Pythagoreans,  the  Infinite,  the  Unlimited,  or 
Unchecked,  was  marked  as  evil,  in  opposition  to 
good,  which  was  the  Limited.  From  thence,  Plato, 
taking  up  his  parable,  writes  :  "  The  goddess  of  the 
Limit,  my  fair  Philebus,  seeing  insolence  and  all 
manner  of  wickedness  breaking  loose  from  all  limit 
in  point  of  gratification  and  gluttonous  greed,  estab- 
lished a  law  and  order  of  limited  being ;  and  you 
say  this  restraint  was  the  death  of  pleasure;  I  say 
it  was  the  saving  of  it."  Going  upon  the  tradition 
of  his  countrymen,  upon  their  art  and  philosophy, 
their  poetry,   eloquence,  politics,  and   inmost  senti- 


OF  THE   MEAN  IN  MORAL    VIRTUE.  83 

menf.,  Aristotle  formulated  the  law  of  moral  virtue, 
to  hold  by  the  golden  mean,  as  discerned  by  the 
prudent  in  view  of  the  present  circumstances,  be- 
tween the  two  extremes  of  excess  and  defect. 

6.  There  is  only  one  object  on  which  man  may 
throw  himself  without  reserve,  his  last  end,  the 
adequate  object  of  his  happiness,  God.  God  is 
approached  by  faith,  hope,  and  charity;  but  it 
belongs  not  to  philosophy  to  speak  of  these  super- 
natural virtues.  There  remains  to  the  philosopher 
the  natural  virtue  of  religion,  which  is  a  part  of 
justice.  Religion  has  to  do  with  the  inward  act  of 
veneration  and  with  its  outward  expression.  To 
the  latter  the  rule  of  the  mean  at  once  applies. 
Moderation  in  religion  is  necessary,  so  far  as  ex- 
ternals are  concerned.  Not  that  any  outward 
assiduity,  pomp,  splendour,  or  costliness,  can  be 
too  much  in  itself,  or  anything  like  enough,  to 
worship  God  with,  but  it  may  be  too  much  for  our 
limited  means,  which  in  this  world  are  drawn  on  by 
other  calls.  But  our  inward  veneration  for  God 
and  desire  to  do  Him  honour,  can  never  be  too 
intense :  "  Blessing  the  Lord,  exalt  Him  as  much  as 
you  can  :  for  He  is  above  all  praise."  * 

7.  The  rule  of  the  mean,  then,  is  a  human  rule, 
for  dealing  with  men,  and  with  human  goods  con- 
sidered as  means.  It  is  a  Greek  rule :  for  the 
Greeks  were  of  all  nations  the  fondest  admirers  of 
man  and  the  things  of  man.  But  when  we  ascend 
to  God,  we  are  out  among  the  immensities  and 
eternities.     The  vastness    of  creation,  the    infinity 

•  Ecclus.  xliii.  33. 


Rs  OF  HABITS  AND    VIRTUES. 

of  the  Creator, — there  is  no  mode  or  measure  there. 
In  those  heights  the  Hebrew  Psalmist  loved  to  soar. 
Christianity,  with  its  central  dogma  of  the  Incarna- 
tion, is  the  meeting  of  Hebrew  and  Greek.  Tliat 
mystery  clothes  the  Lord  God  of  hosts  with  the 
measured  beauty,  grace,  and  truth,  that  man  can 
enter  into.  But  enough  of  this.  Enough  to  show 
that  the  Aristotelian  doctrine  of  the  mean  is  a  highly 
suggestive  and  wide-reaching  doctrine  beyond  the 
sphere  of  Morals.  It  throws  out  one  great  branch 
Into  Art,  another  into  Theology. 

8.  The  vicious  extremes,  on  this  side  and  on 
that  of  a  virtue,  are  not  always  conterminous  with 
the  virtue  itself,  but  sometimes  another  and  more 
excellent  virtue  intervenes ;  as  in  giving  we  may 
pass  from  justice  to  liberality,  and  only  through 
passing  the  bounds  of  liberality,  do  we  arrive  at  the 
vicious  extreme  of  prodigality.  So  penitential  fasting 
intervenes  between  temperance  in  food  and  undue 
neglect  of  sustenance.  But  it  is  to  be  noted  that 
the  central  virtue,  so  to  speak,  as  justice,  sobriety, 
chastity,  is  for  all  persons  on  all  occasions :  the 
more  excellent  side-virtue,  as  liberality,  or  total 
abstinence,  is  for  special  occasions  and  special 
classes  of  persons. 

Readings. — Ar.,  Eth.,  II.,  ii.,  6,  7;  ib.,  II.,  cc.  6 — 9; 
Hor.,  Odes,  II.,  10;  Ruskin,  Modern  Painters,  p.  3,  s.  i., 
c.  X. 

Section  V. — Of  Cardinal  Virtues, 

I.  The  enumeration  of  cardinal  virtues  is  a  piece 
of  Greek  philosophy  that  has  found  its  ways  into  the 


CI-'   CARDINAL    VIRTUES.  85 

catechism.  Prudence,  justice,  fortitude,  and  temper- 
ance are  mentioned  by  Plato  as  recognised  heads  of 
virtue.  They  are  recognised,  though  less  clearly,  by 
Xenophon,  reporting  the  conversations  of  Socrates. 
It  docs  not  look  as  though  Socrates  invented  the 
division :  he  seems  to  have  received  it  from  an 
earlier  source,  possibly  Pythagoras.  They  are  men- 
tioned in  Holy  Scripture  (Wisdom  viii.,  7,  which  is 
however  a  Greek  book),  and  Proverbs  viii.,  14.  They 
make  no  figure  in  the  philosophies  of  India  and 
China. 

2.  The  cardinal  virtues  are  thus  made  out. — 
Virtue  is  a  habit  that  gives  a  man  readiness  in 
behaving  according  to  the  reason  that  is  in  him. 
Such  a  habit  may  be  fourfold,  (a)  It  may  reside 
in  the  reason,  or  intellect  itself,  enabling  it  readily 
to  discern  the  reasonable  thing  to  do,  according  to 
particular  circumstances  as  they  occur.  That  habit 
is  the  virtue  of  prudence,  (b)  It  may  reside  in  the 
rational  appetite,  otherwise  called  the  will,  disposing 
a  man  to  act  fairly  and  reasonably  in  his  dealings 
with  other  men.  That  is  justice,  (c)  It  may  reside 
in  the  irrational,  or  sensitive,  appetite,  and  that  to 
a  twofold  purpose;  (a)  to  restrain  the  said  appe- 
tite in  its  concupiscible  part  from  a  wanton  and 
immoderate  eagerness  after  pleasure  ;  that  is  tem- 
perance :  OS)  to  incite  the  said  appetite  in  its 
irascible  part  not  to  shrink  from  danger,  where 
there  is  reason  for  going  on  in  spite  of  danger ;  that 
is  fortitude. 

3.  Plato  compares  the  rational  soul  in  man  to 
a  charioteer,  driving  two  horses  :  one  horse  repre- 


86  OF  HABITS   AND    VIRTUES. 

senting  the  concupiscible,  the  other  the  irascible 
part  of  the  sensitive  appetite.  He  draws  a  vivid 
picture  of  the  resistance  of  the  concupiscible  part 
against  reason,  how  madly  it  rushes  after  lawless 
pleasure,  and  how  it  is  only  kept  in  restraint  by 
main  force  again  and  again  applied,  till  gradually 
it  grows  submissive.  This  submissiveness,  gradually 
acquired,  is  the  virtue  of  temperance.  Clearly  the 
habit  dwells  in  the  appetite,  not  in  reason :  in  the 
horse,  not  in  the  charioteer.  It  is  that  habitual 
state,  which  in  a  horse  we  call  being  broken  in. 

The  concupiscible  appetite  is  broken  in  to  reason 
by  temperance  residing  within  it.  Plato  lavishes  all 
evil  names  on  the  steed  that  represents  the  con- 
cupiscible part.  But  the  irascible  part,  the  other 
steed,  has  its  own  fault,  and  that  fault  twofold, 
sometimes  of  over-venturesomeness,  sometimes  of 
shying  and  turning  tail.  The  habit  engendered,  in 
the  irascible  part,  of  being  neither  over-venturesome 
nor  over-timorous,  but  going  by  reason,  is  termed 
fortitude.* 

4.  As  the  will  is  the  rational  appetite,  the  proper 
object  of  which  is  rational  good,  it  does  not  need  to 
be  prompted  by  any  habit  to  embrace  rational  good 
m  what  concerns  only  the  inward  administration 
of  the  agent's  own  self.  There  is  no  difficulty  in 
that  department,  provided  the  sensitive  appetite  be 
kept   in   hand   by   fortitude  and   temperance.      But 

*  It  will  help  an  Englishman  to  understand  Plato's  compariscn, 
If  instead  of  concupiscible  part  and  irascible  part,  we  call  the  one  steed 
Passion  and  the  other  Pluck.  Pluck  fails,  and  Passion  runs  to 
axress,  till  Pluck  is  formed  to  fortitude,  and  Passion  to  temperance. 


OF  PRUDENCE.  87 


where  there  is  question  of  external  relations  with 
other  men,  it  is  not  enough  that  the  sensitive 
appetite  be  regulated,  but  a  third  virtue  is  necessary, 
the  habit  of  justice,  to  be  planted  in  the  will,  which 
would  otherwise  be  too  weak  to  attend  steadily  to 
points,  not  of  the  agent's  own  good  merely,  but  of 
the  good  of  other  men. 

5.  Thus  we  have  the  four  cardinal  virtues : 
prudence,  a  habit  of  the  intellect ;  temperance, 
a  habit  of  the  concupiscible  appetite;  fortitude,  a 
habit  of  the  irascible  appetite;  and  justice,  a  habit 
of  the  will.  Temperance  and  Fortitude  in  the 
Home  Department;  Justice  for  Foreign  Affairs; 
with  Prudence  for  Premier.  Or,  to  use  another 
comparison,  borrowed  from  Plato,  prudence  is  the 
health  of  the  soul,  temperance  its  beauty,  fortitude 
its  strength,  and  justice  its  wealth. 

Readmgs. — St.Thos.,  la  2cC,  q.  61,  art.  2,  in 
Corp. ;  ib.,  q.  56,  art.  4,  in  corp.,  ad  i — 3  ;  ib.,  q.  56, 
art.  6,  in  corp.,  ad  i,  3  ;  ib.,  q.  59,  art.  4,  in  corp., 
ad  2 ;  Plato,  Laws,  631  B,  c. 

Section  VI. — Of  Prudena. 

I.  Prudence  is  right  reation  applied  to  practice,  or 
more  fully  it  may  be  defined,  the  habit  of  intellectual 
discernment  that  enables  one  to  hit  upon  the  golden 
mean  of  moral  virtue  and  the  way  to  secure  that 
mean.  Thus  prudence  tells  one  what  amount  of 
punishment  is  proper  for  a  particular  delinquent, 
and  how  to  secure  his  getting  it.  It  is  to  be  ob- 
served that  prudence  does  not  will  the  golden  mean 
in  question,  but  simply  indicates  it.     To  will  and 


88  OF   HABITS   AND    VIRTUES. 

desire  the  mean  is  the  work  of  the  moral  virtue 
concerned  therewith :  as  in  the  case  given  it  is  the 
work  of  vindictive  justice. 

2.  From  the  definition  of  moral  virtue  above 
given  (c.  v.,  s.  iv.,  n.  4,  p.  79),  it  is  clear  that  no 
moral  virtue  can  come  into  act  without  prudence  : 
for  it  is  the  judgment  of  the  prudent  man  that  must 
define  in  each  case  the  golden  mean  in  relation  to 
ourselves,  which  every  moral  virtue  aims  at.  Thus, 
without  prudence,  fortitude  passes  into  rashness, 
vindictive  justice  into  harshness,  clemency  into 
weakness,  religion  into  superstition. 

3.  But  may  not  one  with  no  prudence  to  guide 
him  hit  upon  the  golden  mean  by  some  happy 
impulse,  and  thus  do  an  act  of  virtue  ?  We  answer, 
he  may  do  a  good  act,  and  if  )'ou  will,  a  virtuous  act, 
but  not  an  act  of  virtue,  not  an  act  proceeding  from 
a  pre-existent  habit  in  the  doer.  The  act  is  like  a 
good  stroke  made  by  chance,  not  by  skill ;  and  like 
such  a  stroke,  it  cannot  be  readily  repeated  at  the 
agent's  pleasure.  (See  c.  v.,  s.  i.,  n.  4,  p.  66;  and 
Ar.,  Eth.,  II.,  iv.,  2.) 

4.  Prudence  in  its  essence  is  an  intellectual  virtue, 
being  a  habit  resident  in  the  understanding :  but  it 
deals  with  the  subject-matter  of  the  moral  virtues, 
pointing  out  the  measure  of  temperance,  the  bounds 
of  fortitude,  or  the  path  of  justice.  It  is  the  habit 
of  intellectual  discernment  that  must  enlighten  every 
rporal  virtue  in  its  action.  There  is  no  virtue  that 
goes  blundering  and  stumbling  in  the  dark. 

5.  He  is  a  prudent  man,  that  can  give  counsel  to 
others  and  to  himself  in  order  to  the  attainment  of 


OF   PRUDENCE.  «9 

ends  that  are  worthy  of  human  endeavour.  If 
unworthy  ends  are  nitended,  however  sagaciously 
they  are  pursued,  that  is  not  prudence.  We  may 
call  it  sagacity,  or  shrewdness,  being  a  habit  of  ready 
discernment  and  application  of  means  to  ends. 
Napoleon  I.  was  conspicuous  for  this  sagacity.  It 
is  the  key  to  success  in  this  world.  But  prudence 
discovers  worthy  ends  only,  and  to  them  only  does 
it  provide  means.  The  intellect  is  often  blinded  by 
passion,  by  desire  and  by  fear,  so  as  not  to  discern 
the  proper  end  and  term  to  make  for  in  a  particular 
instance  and  a  practical  case.  The  general  rules  of 
conduct  remain  in  the  mind,  as  that,  "  In  anger  be 
mindful  of  mercy:"  but  the  propriety  of  mercy 
under  the  present  provocation  drops  out  of  sight. 
The  intellect  does  not  discern  the  golden  mean  of 
justice  and  mercy  in  relation  to  the  circumstances 
in  which  the  agent  now  finds  himself.  In  other 
words,  the  habit  of  prudence  has  failed  ;  and  it  has 
failed  because  of  the  excess  of  passion.  Thus  pru- 
dence is  dependent  on  the  presence  of  the  virtues 
that  restrain  passion,  namely,  fortitude  and  temper- 
ance. A  like  argument  would  hold  for  the  virtue 
of  justice,  that  rectifies  inordinate  action  in  dealing 
with  another.  The  conclusion  is,  that  as  the  moral 
virtues  cannot  exist  without  prudence,  so  neither 
can  prudence  exist  without  them :  for  vice  corrupts 
the  judgment  of  prudence. 

6.  Hence  we  arrive  at  a  settlement  of  the  question, 
whether  the  virtues  can  be  separated,  or  whether  to 
possess  one  is  to  possess  all.  We  must  distinguish 
between  the  rudimentary  forms  of  virtue  and  the 


90  OF   HABITS   AND    VIRTUES. 


perfect  habit.  The  rudimentary  forms  certainly  can 
exist  separate  :  they  are  a  matter  of  temperament 
and  inherited  constitution :  and  the  man  whom 
nature  has  kindly  predisposed  to  benevolence,  she 
has  perhaps  very  imperfectly  prepared  for  prudence, 
fortitude,  or  sobriety.  But  one  perfect  habit  of  any 
one  of  the  four  cardinal  virtues,  acquired  by  repeated 
acts,  and  available  at  the  call  of  reason,  involves  the 
presence,  in  a  matured  state,  of  the  other  three 
habits  also.  A  man  who  acts  irrationally  upon  one 
ground,  will  behave  irrationally  on  other  grounds 
also :  or  if  his  conduct  be  rational  there,  it  will  not 
be  from  regard  for  reason,  but  from  impulse,  tem- 
perament, or  from  some  other  motive  than  the 
proper  motive  of  the  virtue  which  he  seems  to  be 
exercising. 

Readings. — St.Thos.,  la  2ie,  q.  54,  art.  4;  ih.,  q.  58, 
art.  5,  in  corp. ;  ib.,  2a  2£e,  q.  47,  art.  7,  12,  13; 
Ar,,  Eth.,  VI.,  V. ;  ib.,  VI.,  xii.,  g,  10 ;  ib.,  VI.,  xiii.,  6 ; 
St.  Francis  of  Sales,  Of  the  Love  of  God,  bk.  xi., 
c.  vii. 

Section  VII. — Of  Temperance. 

I.  Temperance  is  a  virtue  which  regulates  by  the 
judgment  of  reason  those  desires  and  delights  which 
attend  upon  the  operations  whereby  human  nature 
is  preserved  in  the  individual  and  propagated  in  the 
species.  Temperance  is  the  virtue  contrary  to  the 
two  deadly  sins  of  Gluttony  and  Lust.  As  against 
the  former,  it  represeiits  Abstinence,  or  moderation 
in  solid  food,  and  Sobriety,  which  is  moderation  in 
drink.     As  against  the  latter,  it  is  the  great  virtue  of 


OF  'lEMPERANCE.  91 

Chastity.  The  student  must  bear  in  mind  that,  to 
a  philosopher,  Temperance  does  not  mean  Total 
Abstinence,  and  Abstinence  is  quite  independent  of 
Frida3'S  and  flesh-meat.  Temperance  then  is  made 
up  of  Abstinence,  Sobriety,  and  Chastity. 

Aristotle  writes  :  "  Cases  of  falling  short  in 
the  taking  of  pleasure,  and  of  people  enjoying 
themselves  less  than  they  ought,  are  not  apt  to 
occur :  for  such  insensibility  is  not  human  :  but  if 
there  be  any  one  to  whom  nothing  is  pleasant,  and 
all  comes  alike  in  the  matter  of  taste,  he  must  be  far 
from  the  state  and  condition  of  humanity:  such  a 
being  has  no  name,  because  he  is  nowhere  met 
with."  This  is  true,  because  where  there  is  question 
of  a  virtue,  such  as  Temperance,  resident  in  the 
concupiscible  appetite,  we  are  not  concerned  with 
any  sullenness  or  moroseness  of  will,  nor  with  any 
scrupulosity  or  imbecility  of  judgment,  refusing  to 
gratify  the  reasonable  cravings  of  appetite,  but  with 
the  habitual  leaning  and  lie  of  the  appetite  itself. 
Now  the  concupiscible  appetite  in  every  man,  of  its 
own  nature,  leans  to  its  proper  object  of  delectable 
good.  No  virtue  is  requisite  to  secure  it  from 
too  little  inclination  that  way :  but  to  restrain  the 
appetite  from  going  out  excessively  to  delight  is  the 
function,  and  the  sole  function,  of  Temperance. 
The  measure  of  restraint  is  relative,  as  the  golden 
mean  is  relative,  and  varies  with  different  persons 
and  in  view  of  different  ends.  The  training  of  the 
athlete  is  not  the  training  of  the  s^int. 

3.  Besides  the  primary  virtue  of  Temperance,  and 
its   subordinate    species    (enumerated    above,   n.  i), 


92  OF  HABITS  AND    VIRTUES 


certain  other  virtues  are  brought  under  Temperance 
in  a  secondary  sense,  as  observing  in  easier  matters 
that  moderation  and  self- restraint  which  the  primary 
virtue  keeps  in  the  matter  that  is  most  difficult  of 
all.  St.  Thomas  calls  these  potential  parts  of  Tem- 
perance. There  is  question  here  of  what  is  most 
difficult  to  man  as  an  animal,  not  of  what  is  most 
difficult  to  him  as  a  rational  being.  To  rational  man, 
as  sucli,  ambition  is  harder  to  restrain  than  sensu- 
ality: which  is  proved  by  the  fact  that  fewer  men,  who 
have  any  ambition  in  them,  do  restrain  that  passion 
than  those  who  restrain  the  animal  propensities  that 
are  common  to  all.  But  to  man  as  an  animal  (and 
vast  numbers  of  the  human  race  rise  little  above  the 
animal  state),  it  is  hardest  of  all  things  to  restrain 
those  appetites  that  go  with  the  maintenance  and 
propagation  of  flesh  and  blood.  These  then  are 
the  proper  matter  of  Temperance :  other  virtues, 
potential  parts  of  Temperance,  restrain  other 
cravings  which  are  less  animal.  Of  these  virtues 
the  most  noticeable  are  humility,  meekness,  and 
modesty.* 

4.  There  is  a  thirst  after  honour  and  pre- 
eminence, arising  from  self-esteem,  and  prevalent 
especially  where  there  is  little  thought  of  God,  and 
scant  reverence  for  the  present  majesty  of  heaven. 
A  man  who  thinks  little  of  his  Maker  is  great  in  his 
own  eyes,  as  our  green  English  hills  are  mountains 
to   one  who  has  not  seen   the  Alpine  heights  and 

•  This  is  St.  Thomas's  arrangement,  placing  HumiHty  under 
Temperance.  The  connection  of  Humility  with  Magnanimity,  and 
thereby  with  Fortitude,  is  indicated  pp.  100,  ici 


OF   TEMPERANCE.  93 


snows.  Apart  from  the  consideration  of  God  there 
is  no  humihty ;  and  this  is  why  Aristotle,  who  treats 
of  virtues  as  they  minister  to  the  dealings  of  man 
with  man,  makes  no  mention  of  this  virtue.  There 
are  certain  outward  manifestations  in  words,  acts, 
and  gestures,  the  demeanour  of  a  humble  man, 
which  is  largely  identified  with  modesty  and  with 
submission  to  others  as  representing  God. 

5.  Modesty  is  that  outward  comportment,  style 
of  dress,  conversation,  and  carriage,  which  indi- 
cates the  presence  of  Temperance,  "set  up  on 
holy  pedestal"  (Plato,  Phcedr.,  254  b)  in  the  heart 
within. 

6.  Meekness  is  moderation  in  anger,  and  is  or 
should  be  the  virtue  of  all  men.  Clemency  is 
moderation  in  punishment,  and  is  the  virtue  of  men 
in  office,  who  bear  the  sword  or  the  rod. 

7.  As  regards  the  vices  opposite  to  Temperance, 
an  important  distinction  is  to  be  drawn  between 
him  who  sins  by  outburst  of  passion  and  him  whose 
very  principles  are  corrupt.*  The  former  in  doing 
evil  acknowledges  it  to  be  evil,  and  is  prone  to  repent 
of  it  afterwards :  the  latter  has  lost  his  belief  in 
virtue,  and  his  admiration  for  it:  he  drinks  in  iniquity 
like  water,  with  no  after-qualms ;  he  glories  in  his 
shame.  The  former  is  reclaimable,  the  latter  is 
reprobate :  his  intellect  as  well  as  his  heart  is 
vitiated  and  gone  bad.  If  there  were  no  miracles, 
he  would  be  a  lost  man  :  but  God  can  work  miracles 
in  the  moral  as  in  the  physical  order :  in  that  there 
is  hope  for  him. 

•  See  the  note  in  Aquinas  Ethicus.  Vol.  I  ,  pp.  170,  171. 


94  OF   HABITS   AND    VIRTUES. 

8.  A  nation  need  not  be  virtuous  in  the  great 
bulk  of  her  citizens,  to  be  great  in  war  and  in 
dominion,  in  laws,  in  arts,  and  in  literature :  but  the 
bulk  of  the  people  must  possess  at  least  the  sense 
and  appreciation  of  virtue  in  order  to  such  national 
greatness.  When  that  sense  is  lost,  the  nation 
is  undone  and  become  impotent,  for  art  no  less 
than  for  empire.  Thus  the  Greece  of  Pericles  and 
of  Phidias  fell,  to  be  "  living  Greece  no  more." 

g.  As  in  other  moral  matters,  no  hard  and  fast 
h'ne  of  division  exists  between  sinning  from  passion 
and  sinning  on  principle,  but  cases  of  the  one 
shade  into  cases  of  the  others,  and  by  frequent 
indulgence  of  passion  principle  is  brought  gradually 
to  decay. 

Readings. — At.,  Eth.,  III.,  x. ;  St.  Thos.,  2a  2£e, 
q.  141,  art.  2;  ib.,  q.  141,  art.  3,  in  corp.;  ib.,  q.  142, 
art.  i;  ib.,  q.  143,  art.  i,  in  corp.,  ad  2,  3;  ib.,  q.  161, 
art.  I,  ad  5 ;  ib.,  q.  161,  art.  2,  in  corp. ;  ib.,  q.  161,  art. 
6,  in  Corp.,  ad  i ;  ib.,  q.  157,  art.  i,  in  corp.,  ad  3; 
ib.,  q.  156,  art.  3;  Ar.,  Eth.,  VII.,  viii. 

Section  VIII. — Of  Ecrtitude. 

I.  As  Temperance  is  a  curb,  restraining  animal 
nature  in  the  pursuit  of  the  good  to  which  it  goes  out 
most  eagerly,  namely,  life  and  the  means  of  its  con- 
tinuance, so  Fortitude  also  is  a  curb,  withholding  that 
nature  from  irrational  flight  from  the  evil  which  it 
most  dreads.  Aristotle  tells  us  what  that  evil  is :  **  Most 
dreadful  of  all  things  is  death,  for  it  is  the  limit,  and 
for  the  dead  man  there  appears  to  be  no  further  good 
ncr  evil  left."  (Eth.,  Ill  ,  vi,.  0.^     Death  is  truly  the 


OF  FORTITUDE.  gs 


limit  to  human  existence :  for,  though  the  soul  be 
immortal,  the  beinj:^  of  flesh  and  blood,  that  we  call 
man,  is  dissolved  in  death,  and,  apart  from  super- 
natural hope  of  the  resurrection,  extinct  for  ever. 
Death  therefore  is  the  direst  of  all  evils  in  the  animal 
economy;  and  as  such,  is  supremely  abhorred  by 
the  sensitive  appetite,  which  is  the  animal  part  of 
man.  Fortitude  moderates  this  abhorrence  and  fear 
by  the  dictate  of  reason.  Reason  shows  that  there 
are  better  things  than  life,  and  things  worse  than 
death,  for  man  in  his  spiritual  capacity  as  an 
intellectual  and  immortal  being. 

2.  Fortitude  is  a  mean  between  Cowardice 
and  Rashness,  to  which  opposite  extremes  we  are 
carried  by  the  contrary  passions  of  Fear  and 
Daring  respectively.  Fortitude  thus  is  a  two- 
sided  virtue,  moderating  two  opposite  tendencies  : 
while  Temperance  is  one-sided,  moderating  Desire 
alone.  Life,  rationally  considered,  bears  un- 
doubtedly a  high  value,  and  is  not  to  be  lightly 
thrown  away,  or  risked  upon  trivial  or  ignoble 
objects.  The  brave  man  is  circumspect  in  his 
ventures,  and  moderate  in  his  fears,  which  implies 
that  he  does  fear  somewhat.  He  will  fear  super- 
human visitations,  as  the  judgments  of  God.  He 
will  dread  disgrace,  and  still  more,  sin.  He  will  fear 
death  in  an  unworthy  cause.  And  even  in  a  good 
cause,  it  has  well  been  said  :  "  The  truly  brave  man 
is  not  he  who  fears  no  danger,  but  the  man  whose 
mind  subdues  the  fear,  and  braves  the  danger  that 
nature  shrinks  from."  The  Duke  of  Marlborough  is 
said  to  have  quaked  in  the  saddle  as  he  rode  into 


96  OF  HABITS   AND    VIRTUES. 

action,  saying :  '*  This  poor  body  trembles  at  what 
the  mind  within  is  about  to  do."  Fortitude  then  is 
the  virtue  that  restrains  fear  and  regulates  venture- 
someness  by  the  judgment  of  reason,  in  danger 
especially  of  a  grand  and  glorious  death. 

3.  To  the  ancients,  there  was  no  grander  object 
of  devotion  than  the  State,  their  native  city :  no 
direr  misfortune  than  its  dissolution,  or  the  loss  of 
its  self-government :  no  nobler  death  than  to  die  in 
arms  in  its  defence.     As  old  Tyrtseus  sang : 

A  noble  thing  it  is  to  lie  dead,  fallen  in  the  front  ranks, 
A  brave  man  in  battle  for  his  country.* 

Such  a  death  was  taken  to  be  the  seal  and  stamp 
of  the  highest  fortitude.  Nor  has  Christianity 
dimmed  the  glory  that  invests  a  soldier's  death. 
Only  it  points  to  a  brighter  glory,  and  a  death  in  a 
still  nobler  cause,  the  death  of  the  martyr  who  dies 
for  the  faith,  and  becomes  vahant  in  battle  for  what 
is  more  to  him  than  any  earthly  city,  the  Church, 
the  City  of  God.  Nor  must  the  martyr  of  charity, 
who  dies  in  succouring  his  neighbour,  go  without 
the  praise  of  fortitude :  nor,  in  short,  any  one  who 
braves  death,  or  other  heavy  affliction,  in  the  dis- 
charge of  duty,  or  when  forwarding  a  good  cause. 

4.  A  man  may  brave  death  in  a  good  cause,  and 
not  be  doing  an  act  of  fortitude.  So  he  may  sub- 
scribe a  large  sum  to  a  charitable  purpose  without 
any  exercise  of  the  virtue  of  charit}^  A  virtue  is 
then  only  exercised,  when  its  outward  act  is  per- 

rtdvi/jLivat  yap  KaKiv,  fvl  tt pofidxoi or i  inffSyTa, 
ivS/J  ayadhy  irepl  ■§  narpiSi  fj-apyd/xevov. 

(Tyrtaus  apud  Lycurg.) 


OF   FORTITUDE  97 


formed  from  the  proper  motive  of  the  virtue,  and  not 
from  any  lower  motive.  Thus  the  proper  motive 
of  Fortitude  is  the  conviction  that  death  is  an  evil, 
the  risk  of  which  is  to  be  left  out  of  count  as  a  cir- 
cumstance relatively  inconsiderable,  when  there  is 
question  of  the  defence  of  certain  interests  dearer  to 
a  good  man  than  life.  An  improper  motive  would 
be  anger,  which,  however  useful  as  an  accessory,  by 
itself  is  not  an  intellectual  motive  at  all,  and  there- 
fore no  motive  of  virtue.  The  recklessness  of  an 
angry  man  is  not  Fortitude.  It  is  not  Fortitude  to  be 
brave  from  ignorance  or  stupidity,  not  appreciating 
the  danger :  nor  again  from  experience,  knowing 
that  the  apparent  danger  is  not  real,  at  least  to 
yourself.  The  brave  man  looks  a  real  danger  in  the 
face,  and  knows  it,  and  goes  on  in  spite  of  it,  because 
so  it  is  meet  and  just,  with  the  cause  that  he  has,  to 
go  on. 

5.  We  may  notice  as  potential  parts  of  Fortitude 
(s.  vii.,  n.  3,  p.  92),  the  three  virtues  of  Magnifi- 
cence, Magnanimity,  and  Patience.  It  is  the  part  of 
Patience,  philosophically  to  endure  all  sufferings  short 
of  death.  It  is  the  part  of  the  former  two,  to  dare 
wisely,  not  in  a  matter  of  life  and  death,  but  in  the 
matter  of  expense,  for  Magnificence,  and  of  honour, 
for  Magnanimity.  Magnificence,  technically  under- 
stood, observes  the  right  measure  in  the  expenditure 
of  large  sums  of  money.  As  being  conversant  with 
large  sums,  it  differs  from  Liberality.  A  poor  man 
may  be  liberal  out  of  his  little  store,  but  never 
magnificent.  It  is  a  virtue  in  the  rich,  not  to  be 
afraid  of  spending  largely  and  lavishly  on  a  great 
H 


98  OF  HABITS  AND    VIRTUES. 

occasion,  or  a  grand  purpose.  The  expense  may  be 
carried  beyond  what  the  occasion  warrants  :  that  is 
one  vicious  extreme.  The  other  extreme  would  be 
to  mar  a  costly  work  by  sordid  parsimony  on  a  point 
of  detail.  It  is  not  easy  to  be  magnificent :  in  the 
first  place,  because  not  many  are  rich;  and  then 
because  riches  are  seldom  united  with  greatness  of 
soul  and  good  judgment.  Something  analogous  to 
the  virtue  of  Magnificence  is  shown  in  the  generous 
use  of  great  abilities,  or,  in  the  supernatural  order, 
of  great  graces.  The  destinies  of  the  world  lie  with 
those  men  who  have  it  in  their  power  to  be  magni- 
ficent. 

6.  We  are  come  to  Magnanimity  and  the  Mag- 
nanimous Man,  the  great  creation  of  Aristotle.  As 
Magnanimity  ranks  under  Fortitude,  there  must  be 
some  fear  to  which  the  Magnanimous  Man  rises 
superior,  as  the  brave  man  rises  superior  to  the  fear 
of  death.  What  Magnanimity  overcomes  is  the  fear 
of  undeserved  dishonour.  The  Magnanimous  Man 
is  he  who  rates  himself  as  worthy  of  great  honours, 
and  is  so  worthy  indeed.  When  honour  is  paid 
to  such  a  one,  he  makes  no  great  account  of  it, 
feeling  that  it  is  but  his  due,  or  even  less  than  his 
due.  If  he  is  dishonoured  and  insulted,  he  despises 
the  insult  as  an  absurdity,  offered  to  a  man  of  his 
deserts.  He  is  too  conscious  of  his  real  worth  to 
be  much  affected  by  the  expression  of  his  neigh- 
bour's view  of  him.  For  a  man  is  most  elated, 
when  complimented  on  an  excellence  which  he  was 
not  ver}  sure  of  possessing :  and  most  sensibly 
grieved  at  an  insult^  where  he  half  suspects  himself 


OF  FORTITUDE.  99 


of  really  making  a  poor  figure,  whereas  he  would 
like  to  make  a  good  one.  It  is  doubtless  the  serene 
and  settled  conviction  that  Englishmen  generally 
entertain  of  the  greatness  of  their  country,  that 
enables  them  to  listen  with  equanimity  to  abuse  of 
England,  such  as  no  other  people  in  Europe  would 
endure  levelled  at  themselves. 

7.  Proud  is  an  epithet  pretty  freely  applied  to 
Englishmen  abroad,  and  it  seems  to  fit  the  character 
of  the  Magnanimous  Man.  He  seems  a  Pharisee, 
and  worse  than  a  Pharisee.  The  Pharisee's  pride 
was  to  some  extent  mitigated  by  breaking  out  into 
that  disease  of  children  and  silly  persons,  vanity  : 
he  **  did  all  his  works  to  be  seen  of  men."  But 
here  the  disease  is  all  driven  inwards,  and  therefore 
more  malignant.  The  Magnanimous  Man  is  so 
much  in  conceit  with  himself  as  to  have  become  a 
scorner  of  his  fellows.  He  is  self-sufficient,  a  deity 
to  himself,  the  very  type  of  Satanic  pride.  These 
are  the  charges  brought  against  him. 

8.  To  purify  and  rectify  the  character  of  the 
Magnanimous  Man,  we  need  to  take  a  leaf  out  of 
the  book  of  Christianity.  Not  that  there  is  anything 
essentially  Christian  and  supernatural  in  what  we 
are  about  to  allege :  otherwise  it  would  not  belong 
to  philosophy :  it  is  a  truth  of  reason,  but  a  truth 
generally  overlooked,  till  it  found  its  exponent  in  the 
Christian  preacher,  and  its  development  in  the 
articles  of  the  Christian  faith.  The  truth  is  this. 
There  is  in  every  human  being  what  theologians 
have  called  vian  and  man  :  man  as  he  is  of  himself, 
man  again  as  he  is  by  the  gift  and  gracious  mercy 


100  OF  HABITS  AND    VIRTUES. 

of  God.  The  reasonably  Magnanimous  Man  is 
saved  from  pride  by  this  distinction.  Of  himself, 
he  knows  that  he  is  nothing  but  nothingness,  mean- 
ness, sinfulness,  and  a  walking  sore  of  multitudinous 
actual  sins.  "  I  know  that  there  dwelleth  not  in 
me,  that  is,  in  my  flesh,  any  good."  (Rom.  vii.  18.) 
If  he  is  insulted,  he  takes  it  as  his  due,  not  any 
questionable  due,  for  then  he  would  resent  the 
insult,  but  as  being  undoubtedly  what  he  deserves. 
If  he  is  honoured,  he  smiles  at  the  absurdity  of  the 
compliments  paid  to  him.  It  is  as  if  an  old  gentle- 
man, a  prey  to  gout  and  rheumatism,  were  lauded 
for  his  fleetness  of  foot.  He  is  then  truly  magnani- 
mous on  this  side  of  his  character  by  a  kind  of 
obverse  magnanimity,  that  bears  insults  handsomely, 
as  deserved,  and  honours  modestly,  as  undeserved. 

9.  But  let  us  go  round  to  the  other  side  of  the 
reasonably  Magnanimous  Man.  He  was  defined 
to  be,  **  one  that  deems  himself  worthy  of  great 
honours,  and  is  so  worthy  indeed."  Now,  nothing  is 
truly  worthy  of  honour  but  virtue.  He  must  then 
be  a  good  man,  full  of  all  virtues ;  and  all  this  good- 
ness that  he  has,  he  recognises  as  being  in  him 
of  God.  He  has  "  received  God's  Spirit  " — or 
something  analogous  in  the  natural  order  to  the 
gift  of  the  Holy  Ghost — "  that  he  may  know  the 
things  that  are  given  him  of  God."  (2  Cor.  ii.  12.) 
It  is  told  of  St.  Francis  of  Assisi,  the  humblest  of 
men,  that  on  one  occasion  when  he  and  his  com- 
panions received  from  some  persons  extraordinary 
marks  of  veneration,  he,  contrary  to  his  usual  wont, 
took  it  not  at  all  amiss ;  and  said  to  his  companions. 


Ot'  FOntlTUDE.  la\ 


who  wondered  at  his  behaviour,  "  Let  them  alone  : 
they  cannot  too  much  honour  the  work  of  God  in 
us."  This  magnanimity  bears  honours  gracefully, 
and  insult  unflinchingly,  from  a  consciousness  of 
internal  worth,  which  internal  worth  and  goodness 
however  it  takes  not  for  its  own  native  excellence, 
but  holds  as  received  from  God,  and  unto  God  it 
refers  all  the  glory. 

10.  Thus  the  genuine  Magnanimous  Man  is  a 
paradox  and  a  prodigy.  He  despises  an  insult  as 
undeserved,  and  he  takes  it  as  his  due.  He  is 
conscious  of  the  vast  good  that  is  in  him  ;  and  he 
knows  that  there  is  no  good  in  him.  Highly 
honoured,  he  thinks  that  he  gets  but  his  due,  while 
he  believes  that  vials  of  scorn  and  ignominy  may 
justly  be  poured  upon  him.  He  will  bear  the  scorn, 
because  he  deserves  it,  and  again,  because  it  is 
wholly  undeserved.  The  Magnanimous  Man  is  the 
humble  man.  The  secret  of  his  marvellous  virtue  is 
his  habit  of  practical  discernment  between  the  abyss 
of  misery  that  he  has  within  himself,  as  of  himself, 
and  the  high  gifts,  also  within  him,  which  come  of 
the  mercy  of  God.  Aristotle  well  says,  "  Magnani- 
mity is  a  sort  of  robe  of  honour  to  the  rest  of  the 
virtues :  it  both  makes  them  greater  and  stands 
not  without  them  :  therefore  it  is  hard  to  be  truly 
magnanimous,  for  that  cannot  be  without  perfect 
virtue."  We  may  add,  that  in  the  present  order  of 
Providence  none  can  be  magnanimous  without 
supernatural  aid,  and  supernatural  considerations 
of  the  life  of  Christ,  which  however  are  not  in 
place  here. 


102  OF  HABITS   AND    VIRTUES. 

Readings. — Ar.,  Eth.,  III.,  vii. ;  St.  Thos.,  2a  2as, 
q.  123,  art  3,  in  corp. ;  Ar.,  Eth.,  III.,  viii.  ;  St.  Thos., 
2a  2se,  q.  123,  art.  i,  ad  2;  Ar.,  Eth.,  III.,  vi. ;  St. 
Thos.,  2a  2£e,  q.  123,  art.  4,  5.  For  the  Magnificent 
and  Magnanimous  Man,  Ar.,  Eth.,  IV.,  ii.,  iii. ;  St. 
Thos.,  2a  2se,  q.  129,  art.  3,  ad  4,  5. 

Section  IX. — Of  Justice. 

I.  Justice  is  a  habit  residing  in  the  will,  prompt- 
ing that  power  constantly  to  render  unto  everyone 
his  own.  The  fundamental  notion  of  Justice  is  some 
sort  of  equality.  Equality  supposes  two  terms, 
physically  distinct,  or  capable  of  existing  separately, 
one  from  the  other.  Between  such  terms  alone  can 
equality  be  properly  predicated.  Any  less  distinc- 
tion than  this  leaves  room  only  for  equality  im- 
properly so  called,  and  therefore  no  room  for  what 
is  properly  termed  Justice.  When  therefore  Plato, 
going  about  to  find  a  definition  of  Justice,  which  is 
a  main  object  in  his  Republic,  acquiesces  in  this 
position,  that  Justice  consists  in  every  part  of  the 
soul,  rational,  irascible,  and  concupiscible,  fulfilling 
its  own  proper  function,  and  not  taking  up  the 
function  of  another,  he  fails  for  this  reason,  that  all 
Justice  is  relative  to  another,  but  the  dilterent  parts 
of  one  soul  are  not  properly  otlier  and  other,  since  all 
go  to  make  up  one  man  :  therefore,  however  much 
Justice  may  be  identical  with  doing  j^our  own  busi- 
ness, and  leaving  your  neighbour  free  to  do  his,  yet 
this  relation  obtaining  among  the  various  parts  of 
the  soul  cannot  properly  be  called  Justice.  What 
Plato  defines  is  the  beauty,  good  order,  and  moral 


OF  JUSTICE.  103 


comeliness  of  the  soul,  but  not  Justice  in  any  sense, 
inasmuch  as  it  is  not  referred  to  any  being  human 
or  divine,  collective  or  individual,  outside  of  the 
man  himself. 

2.  Going  upon  the  principle  that  all  Justice  is  of 
the  nature  of  equality,  and  is  therefore  relative  to 
another,  we  arrive  at  the  definition  of  general  justice, 
which  is  all  virtue  whatsoever,  inasmuch  as  it  bears 
upon  another  person  than  him  who  practises  it. 
This  Justice  is  perfect  social  virtue,  the  crown  and 
perfection  of  all  virtue  from  a  statesman's  point  of 
view  ;  and  in  that  aspect,  as  Aristotle  says,  "neither 
morning  star  nor  evening  star  is  so  beautiful." 
Whoever  has  this  virtue  behaves  well,  not  by  himself 
merely,  but  towards  others — a  great  addition.  Many 
a  one  who  has  done  well  enough  as  an  individual, 
has  done  badly  in  a  public  capacity :  whence  the 
proverb,  that  office  shows  the  man.  This  Justice 
may  well  be  called  another  man's  good:  though  not 
in  the  sense  of  the  sophists  of  old,  and  the  altruists 
of  our  time,  that  virtue  is  a  very  good  thing  for 
everyone  else  than  its  possessor.  Virtue,  like  health, 
may  be  beneficial  to  neighbours,  but  the  first  benefit 
of  it  flows  in  upon  the  soul  to  whom  it  belongs  :  for 
virtue  is  the  health  of  the  soul. 

3.  Another  elementary  notion  of  Justice  connects 
it  with  Law,  taking  Justice  to  be  conformity  to  Law. 
This  notion  exhibits  legal  justice,  which  is  the  same 
thing,  under  another  aspect,  as  the  general  justice 
mentioned  above,  inasmuch  as  general  justice  in- 
cludes the  exercise  of  all  virtues  in  so  far  as  they 
bear  upon  the  good  of  others  :  and  the  law,  to  which 


X04  OF   HABITS   AND    VIRTUES. 


legal  justice  conforms  a  man,  enjoins  acts  of  all 
virtues  for  the  common  good.  It  must  be  observed, 
however,  that  though  there  is  no  natural  virtue  ot 
which  the  law  of  man  may  not  prescribe  some  exer- 
cise, still  no  human  law  enjoins  all  acts  of  all  virtues, 
not  even  all  obligatory  acts.  A  man  may  fail  in  his 
duty  though  he  has  kept  all  the  laws  of  man.  In 
order  then  that  legal  justice  may  include  the  whole 
duty  of  man,  it  must  be  referred  to  that  natural  and 
eternal  law  of  God,  revealed  or  unrevealed,  of  which 
we  shall  speak  hereafter.  By  being  conformed  to 
this  divine  law  a  man  is  a  just  man,  a  righteous  man. 
It  is  this  sense  of  Justice  that  appears  in  the  theo- 
logical term,  justification.  In  this  sense,  Zachary 
and  Elizabeth  "  were  both  just  before  God,  walking 
in  all  the  commandments  of  the  Lord  without 
blame."  (St.  Luke  i.  6.) 

4.  General,  or  legal,  justice  is  not  the  cardinal 
virtue  so  called,  but  is  in  one  point  of  view  identical 
with  all  virtue.  Distinguished  from  the  other  three 
cardinal  virtues  is  particular  justice,  which  is  divided 
into  distributive  and  commutative  justice.  Distributive 
justice  is  exercised  by  the  community  through  its 
head  towards  its  individual  members,  so  that  there 
be  a  fair  distribution  of  the  common  goods,  in  vary- 
ing amount  and  manner,  according  to  the  various 
merits  and  deserts  of  the  several  recipients.  The 
matters  distributed  are  public  em.oluments  and 
honours,  public  burdens,  rewards,  and  also  punish- 
ments. Distributive  justice  is  the  virtue  of  the  king 
and  of  the  statesman,  of  the  commander-in-chief, 
of  the  judge,  and  of  the  public  functionary  gencr- 


OF  JUSTICE.  105 


ally.  It  is  violated  by  favouritism,  partiality,  and 
jobbery.  Distributive  justice  is  the  Justice  that  we 
adore  in  the  great  Governor  of  the  Universe,  saying 
that  He  is  "just  in  all  His  works,"  even  though  we 
understand  them  not.  When  it  takes  the  form  of 
punishing,  it  is  called  vindictive  justice.  This  is  what 
the  multitudes  clamoured  for,  that  filled  the  pre- 
cincts of  the  Palace  of  Whitehall  in  the  days  of 
Charles  I.  with  cries  of  Justice,  Justice,  for  the 
head  of  Strafford. 

5.  Neither  legal  nor  distributive  justice  fully 
answers  to  the  definition  of  that  virtue.  Justice 
disposes  us  to  give  to  another  his  own.  The  party 
towards  whom  Justice  is  practised  must  be  wholly 
other  and  different  from  him  who  practises  it.  But 
it  is  clear  that  the  member  of  a  civil  community  is 
not  wholly  other  and  different  from  the  State  :  he 
is  partially  identified  with  the  civil  community  to 
which  he  belongs.  Therefore  neither  the  tribute  of 
legal  justice  paid  by  the  individual  to  the  State,  nor 
the  grant  of  distributive  justice  from  the  State  to  the 
individual,  is  an  exercise  of  Justice  in  the  strictest 
sense.  Again,  what  the  individiial  pays  to  the  State 
because  he  is  legally  bound  to  pay  it,  docs  not 
become  the  State's  own  until  after  payment.  If  he 
withhold  it,  though  he  do  wrong,  yet  he  is  not  said 
to  be  keeping  any  portion  of  the  public  property  in 
his  private  hands  :  he  only  fails  to  make  some  of  his 
private  property  public,  which  the  law  bids  him 
abdicate  and  make  over.  If  this  be  true  of  money 
and  goods,  it  is  still  more  evidently  true  of  honour 
and  services.     In  like  manner,  in  the  matter  of  dis- 


io6  OF  HABITS  AND    VIRTUES 


tribniive  justice,  the  emoluments  which  a  subject 
has  a  claim  to,  the  rewards  which  he  has  merited  of 
the  State,  does  not  become  his  till  he  actually  gets 
them  into  his  hands.  It  may  be  unfair  and  immoral 
that  they  are  withheld  from  him,  and  in  that  case, 
so  long  as  the  circumstances  remain  the  same,  the 
obligation  rest  with  and  presses  upon  the  State, 
and  those  who  represent  it,  to  satisfy  his  claim  :  still 
the  State  is  not  keeping  the  individual  from  that 
which  is  as  yet  his  own.  In  the  language  of  the 
Roman  lawyers,  he  has  at  best  a  jtis  ad  rem,  a  right 
that  the  thing  be  made  his,  but  not  a  jus  in  re  ;  that 
is,  the  thing  is  not  properly  his  before  he  actually 
gets  it. 

6.  Commutative  justice  alone  is  Justice  strictly  so 
called  :  for  therein  alone  the  parties  to  the  act  are 
perfectly  other  and  other,  and  the  matter  that 
passes  between  them,  if  withheld  by  one  of  the 
parties,  would  make  a  case  of  keeping  the  other  out 
of  that  which  he  could  still  properly  call  by  right  his 
own.  Commutative  justice  runs  between  two  indi- 
viduals, or  two  independent  States,  or  between  the 
State  and  an  individual  inasmuch  as  the  latter  is  an 
independent  person,  having  rights  of  his  own  against 
the  former.  This  justice  is  called  commutative,  from 
being  concerned  with  exchanges,  or  contracts,  volun- 
tary and  involuntary.  The  idea  of  voluntary  con- 
tract, like  that  between  buyer  and  seller,  is  familiar 
enough.  But  the  notion  of  an  involuntary  contract  is 
technical,  and  requires  explanation.  Whoever,  then, 
wrongfully  takes  that  which  belongs  to  another, 
enters   into   an  involuntary  contract,   or  makes  an 


OF  JUSTICE  107 


involuntary  exchange,  with  the  party.  This  he  may 
do  by  taking  away  his  property,  honour,  reputation, 
hberty,  or  bodily  ease  and  comfort.  This  is  an 
involuntary  transaction,  against  the  will  of  the  party 
that  suffers.  It  is  a  contract,  because  the  party  that 
does  the  damage  takes  upon  himself,  whether  he  will 
or  no,  by  the  very  act  of  doing  it,  the  obligation  of 
making  the  damage  good,  and  of  restoring  what  he 
has  taken  away.  This  is  the  obligation  of  restitution, 
which  attaches  to  breaches  of  commutative  iustice, 
and,  strictly  speaking,  to  them  alone.  Thus,  if  a 
minister  has  not  promoted  a  deserving  officer  in 
face  of  a  clear  obligation  of  distributive  justice,  the 
obligation  indeed  remains  as  that  of  a  duty  unful- 
filled, so  long  as  he  remains  minister  with  the 
patronage  in  his  hands :  but  the  promotion,  if  he 
finally  makes  it,  is  not  an  act  of  restitution  :  it  is 
giving  to  the  officer  that  which  was  not  his  before. 
And  if  the  opportunity  has  passed,  he  owes  the 
officer  nothing  in  compensation.  But  if  he  has 
insulted  the  officer,  he  owes  him  an  apology  for  all 
time  to  come  :  he  must  give  back  that  honour  which 
belonged  to  the  officer,  and  of  which  he  has  robbed 
him.  This  is  restitution.  In  a  thousand  practical 
cases  it  is  important,  and  often  a  very  nice  question 
to  decide,  whether  a  particular  offence,  such  as 
failure  to  pay  taxes,  be  a  sin  against  commutative 
justice  or  only  against  some  more  general  form  of 
the  virtue.  If  the  former,  restitution  is  due  :  if  the 
latter,  repentance  only  and  purpose  of  better  things 
in  future,  but  not  reparation  of  the  past. 

7.  The  old  notion,  that  Justice  is  minding  your 


io8  OF  HABITS  AND    VIRTUES. 

own  business,  and  leaving  your  neighbour  to  mind 
his,  furnishes  a  good  rough  statement  of  the  obli- 
gations of  couiumtative  justice.  They  are  mainly 
negative,  to  leave  your  neighbour  alone  in  his  right 
of  life  and  limb,  of  liberty  and  property,  of  honour 
and  reputation.  But  in  two  ways  your  neighbour's 
business  may  become  yours  in  justice.  The  first 
way  is,  if  you  have  any  contract  with  him,  whether 
a  formal  contract,  as  that  between  a  railway  com- 
pany and  its  passengers,  or  a  virtual  contract,  by 
reason  of  some  office  that  you  bear,  as  the  office 
of  a  bishop  and  pastor  in  relation  to  the  souls  of 
his  flock.  The  second  way  in  which  conmmtaiive 
justice  binds  you  to  positive  action,  is  when  undue 
damage  is  likely  to  occur  to  another  from  some 
activity  of  yours.  If,  passing  by,  I  see  my  neigh- 
bour's house  on  fire,  not  having  contracted  to  watch 
it  for  him,  and  not  having  caused  the  fire  myself,  I 
am  not  bound  in  strict  justice  to  warn  him  of  his 
danger.  I  am  bound  indeed  by  charity,  but  that  is 
not  the  point  here.  But  if  the  fire  has  broken  out 
from  my  careless  use  of  fire,  cownmiaiive  justice 
binds  me  to  raise  the  alarm. 

8.  The  most  notable  potential  parts  of  Justice — 
Religion,  Obedience,  Truthfulness — enter  into  the 
treatise  of  Natural  Law. 

Reading. — Ar.,  Eth,,  V,,  i. ;  Plato,  Rep .,  433  A  ; 
ib.,  443  c,  D,  e;  St.  Thos.,  2a  2se,  q.  58,  art.  2,  in  corp; 
ib.,  q.  58,  art.  5  ;  ib.,  q.  58,  art.  6,  in  corp;  ib.,  q.  58, 
art.  7  ;  ib.,  q.  58,  art  9,  in  corp.  ;  ib.,  q.  61,  art.  i,  in 
Corp. ;  ib.,  q.  61,  art.  3,  in  corp. ;  Ar.,  Eth.,  V.,  ii.,  12, 
13  ;  St.  Thos.,  2a  22e,  q.  62,  art.  i,  in  corp.,  ad  2. 


MORAL    PHILOSOPHY. 


Part   II.     Deontology. 


CHAPTER  VL 

OF   THE    ORIGIN    OF    MORAL   OBLIGATION. 

Section  I. — Of  the  natural  difference  between  Good  and  Evil. 

I.  A  GRANITE  boulder  lying  on  an  upland  moor 
stands  indifferently  the  August  sun  and  the  January 
frost,  flood  and  drought.  It  neither  blooms  in 
spring,  nor  fades  in  autumn.  It  is  all  one  to  the 
boulder  whether  it  remain  in  the  picturesque  soli- 
tude where  the  glacier  dropped  it,  or  be  laid  in  the 
gutter  of  a  busy  street.  It  has  no  growth  nor 
development :  it  is  not  a  subject  of  evolution  :  there 
is  no  goal  of  perfection  to  which  it  is  tending  by 
dint  of  inward  germinal  capacity  seconded  by  favour- 
able environment.  Therefore  it  does  not  matter 
what  you  do  with  it :  all  things  come  alike  to  that 
lump  of  rock. 

2.  But  in  a  cranny  or  cleft  of  the  same  there  is 
a  little  flower  growing.  You  cannot  do  what  you 
will  with  that  flower.  It  has  its  exigencies  and 
requirements.  Had  it  a  voice,  it  could  say,  what 
the  stone  never  could  :  '  I  must  have  this  or  that  : 
I  must  have  light,  I  must  have  moisture,  a  certain 
heat,  some  soil  to  grow  in.'  There  is  a  course  to 
be  run  by  this  flower  and  the  plant  that  bears  it, 
a  development  to  be  wrought  out,  a  perfection  tc 


no         OF  THE  ORIGIN   OF   MORAL   OBLIGATION. 

be  achieved.  For  this  end  certain  conditions  are 
necessary,  or  helpful :  certain  others  prejudicial,  or 
altogether  intolerable.  In  fact,  that  plant  has  a 
progressive  nature,  and  therewith  is  a  subject  of 
good  and  evil.  Good  for  that  plant  is  what  favours 
its  natural  progress,  and  evil  is  all  that  impedes  it. 

3.  All  organic  natures  are  progressive :  that  is, 
each  individual  of  them  is  apt  to  make  a  certain 
progress,  under  certain  conditions,  from  birth  to 
maturity.  But  man  alone  has  his  progress  in  any 
degree  in  his  own  hands,  to  make  or  to  mar.  Man 
alone,  in  the  graphic  phrase  of  Appius  Claudius,  is 
faber  foritma:  sues,  "  the  shaper  of  his  own  destiny." 
Any  other  plant  or  animal,  other  than  man,  however 
miserable  a  specimen  of  its  kind  it  finally  prove  to 
be,  has  always  done  the  best  for  itself  under  the  cir- 
cumstances :  it  has  attained  the  limit  fixed  for  it  by 
its  primitive  germinal  capacity,  as  modified  by  the 
events  of  its  subsequent  environment.  The  miser- 
able animal  that  howls  under  your  window  at  night. 
Is  the  finest  dog  that  could  possibly  have  come  of 
his  blood  and  breeding,  nurture  and  education.  But 
there  is  no  man  now  on  earth  that  has  done  all  for 
himself  that  he  might  have  done.  We  all  fall  short 
in  many  things  of  the  perfection  that  is  within  our 
reach.  Man  therefore  needs  to  stir  himself,  and  to 
be  energetic  with  a  free,  self-determined  energy  to 
come  up  to  the  standard  of  humanity.  It  is  only 
his  free  acts  that  are  considered  by  the  moralist. 
Such  is  the  definition  of  Moral  Science,  that  it  deals 
with  human  ads ;  acts,  that  is,  whereof  man  is  master 
to  do  or  not  to  do.  (c.  i.,  nn.  i,  2.) 


DIFFERENCE  BETWEEN  GOOD   AND   EVIL.        in 

4.  We  have  it,  then,  that  a  morally  good  act  is 
an  act  that  makes  towards  the  progress  of  human 
nature  in  him  who  does  it,  and  which  is  freely  done. 
Similarly,  a  morally  evil  act  is  a  bar  to  progress,  or 
a  diversion  of  it  from  the  right  line,  being  also  a 
free  act.  Now,  that  act  only  can  make  for  the 
progress  of  human  nature,  which  befits  and  suits 
human  nature,  and  suits  it  in  its  best  and  most 
distinctive  characteristic.  What  is  best  in  man, 
what  characterises  and  makes  man,  what  the  old 
schoolmen  called  the  form  of  man,  is  his  reason. 
To  be  up  to  reason  is  to  be  up  to  the  standard  of 
humanity.  Human  progress  is  progress  on  the  lines 
of  reason.  To  make  for  that  progress,  and  thereby 
to  be  morally  good,  an  act  must  be  done,  not  blindly, 
brutishly,  sottishly,  or  on  any  impulse  of  passion, 
however  beneficial  in  its  effects,  but  deliberately,  and 
in  conscious  accordance  with  the  reasonable  nature 
of  the  doer. 

5.  Whatever  be  man's  end  and  nighest  good,  he 
must  go  about  to  compass  it  reasonably.  He  must 
plan,  and  be  systematic,  and  act  on  principle.  For 
instance,  if  the  public  health  be  the  highest  good,  the 
laws  which  govern  it  must  be  investigated,  and  their 
requirements  carried  out,  without  regard  to  senti- 
ment. If  pleasure  be  the  good,  we  must  be  artists 
of  pleasure.  If,  however,  as  has  been  seen  (c.  ii.) 
the  highest  good  of  man  is  the  highest  play  of  reason 
herself  in  a  life  of  contemplation,  to  be  prepared 
for,  though  it  cannot  be  adequately  and  worthily 
lived,  in  this  world,  then  it  is  through  following 
reason,  through   subjecting   appetite  to   reason    by 


112         OF  THE  ORIGIN   OF  MORAL   OBLIGATION. 

temperance,  and  the  will  to  reason  by  justice,  and 
reason  herself  by  a  "  reasonable  service  "  to  God, 
that  this  end  and  consummation  must  be  wrought 
out.  Thus,  in  Plato's  phrase  {Rep.,  5S9  b),  the 
moral  man  acts  so  that  "  the  inner  man  within  him, 
the  rational  part  of  his  nature,  shall  be  strongest ; 
while  he  watches  with  a  husbandman's  care  over  the 
many-headed  beast  of  appetite,  rearing  and  training 
the  creature's  tame  heads,  and  not  letting  the  wild 
ones  grow;  for  this  purpose  making  an  ally  of  the 
lion,  the  irascible  part  of  his  nature,  and  caring  for 
all  the  parts  in  common,  making  them  friends  to  one 
another  and  to  himself."  In  this  way  he  will  meet 
the  true  exigency  of  his  nature  as  a  whole,  with  due 
regard  to  the  proper  order  and  subordination  of  the 
parts.  He  who  lives  otherwise,  acts  in  contradiction 
tJ  his  rational  self.  (c.  v.,  s.  iii.,  n.  3,  p.  74). 

6.  The  result  of  the  above  reasoning,  if  result  it 
hcs,  should  be  to  explain  and  justify  ths  Stoic  rule, 
nuturcB  convenienter  vivere,  to  live  according  to  nature. 
Bat  some  one  will  say :  *  That  is  the  very  ideal  of 
wickedness:  all  good  in  man  comes  of  overcoming 
nature,  and  doing  violence  to  natural  cravings : 
live  according  to  nature,  and  you  will  go  straight 
to  the  devil.'  I  answer:  *  Live  according  to  apart  0/ 
your  nature,  and  that  the  baser  and  lower,  though 
also  the  more  impetuous  and  clamorous  part,  and 
you  will  certainly  go  where  you  say  :  but  live  up 
to  the  mhole  of  your  nature,  as  fixpKined  in  the  last 
paragraph,  and  you  will  be  a  man  indeed,  and  will 
reach  the  goal  of  human  happiness.'  But  again  it 
may  be  objected,  that  our  very  re;i.son,  to  whicb  the 


DIFFERENCE  BETWEEN   GOOD   AND  EVIL.        113 

rest  of  our  nature  is  naturally  subordinate,  frequently 
prompts  us  to  do  amiss.  The  objection  is  a  just 
one,  in  so  far  as  it  goes  upon  a  repudiation  of  the  old 
Platonic  position,  that  all  moral  evil  comes  of  the 
body,  wherein  the  soul  is  imprisoned,  and  of  the 
desires  which  the  body  fastens  upon  the  soul.  Were 
that  so,  all  sins  would  be  sins  of  sensuality.  But 
there  are  spiritual  sins,  not  prompted  by  any  lust 
or  weakness  of  the  body,  as  pride  and  mutiny,  sclf- 
opiniatcdness,  rejection  of  Divine  revelation.  The 
objection  turns  on  sins  such  as  these.  The  answer 
is,  that  spiritual  sins  do  not  arise  from  any  exigency 
of  reason,  but  from  a  deficiency  of  reason  ;  not  from 
that  faculty  calling  upon  us,  as  we  are  reasonable 
men,  to  take  a  certain  course,  in  accordance  with  a 
just  and  full  view  of  the  facts  of  the  case,  but  from 
reason  failing  to  look  facts  fully  in  the  face,  and 
considering  only  some  of  them  to  the  neglect  of 
others,  the  consideration  of  which  would  alter  the 
decision.  Thus  a  certain  proud  creature  mentioned 
in  Scripture  thought  of  the  magnificence  of  the 
throne  above  the  stars  of  God,  on  the  mountain  of 
the  covenant,  on  the  sides  of  the  north  :  he  did  not 
think  how  such  a  pre-eminence  w'ould  become  him 
as  a  creature.  He  had  in  view  a  rational  good 
certainly,  but  not  a  rational  good  for  him.  Partial 
reason,  like  a  little  knowledge,  is  a  dangerous  thing. 
7.  As  it  is  not  in  the  power  of  Go  1  to  bring  it 
about,  that  the  angles  of  a  triangle  taken  together 
shall  amount  to  anything  else  than  two  right  angles, 
so  it  is  not  within  the  compass  of  Divine  omnipo- 
tence to  create  a  man  for  whom  it  shall  be  a  j^ood 
I 


114         CF  THE   ORIGIN   OF  MORAL   OBLIGATION. 

and  proper  thing,  and  befitting  his  nature,  to 
blaspheme,  to  perjure  himself,  to  abandon  himself 
recklessly  to  lust,  or  anger,  or  any  other  passion. 
God  need  not  have  created  man  at  all,  but  He  could 
not  have  created  him  with  other  than  human  exigen- 
cies. The  reason  is,  because  God  can  only  create 
upon  the  pattern  of  His  own  essence,  which  is 
imitable,  outside  of  God,  in  certain  definite  lines  of 
possibility.  These  possibilities,  founded  upon  the 
Divine  essence  and  discerned  by  the  Divine  intelli- 
gence, are  the  Archetype  Ideas,  among  which  the 
Divine  will  has  to  choose,  when  it  proceeds  to  create. 
The  denial  of  this  doctrine  in  the  Nominalist  and 
Cartesian  Schools,  and  their  reference  to  the  arbi- 
trary will  of  God  of  the  eternal,  immutable,  and 
absolutely  necessary  relations  of  possible  things,  is 
the  subversion  of  all  science  and  philosophy. 

8.  Still  less  are  moral  distinctions  between  good 
and  evil  to  be  set  down  to  the  law  of  the  State,  or 
the  fashion  of  society.  Human  convention  can  no 
more  constitute  moral  good  than  it  can  physical 
good,  or  mathematical  or  logical  truth.  It  is  only 
in  cases  where  two  or  more  courses  are  tolerable, 
and  one  of  them  needs  to  be  chosen  and  adhered  to 
for  the  sake  of  social  order,  that  human  authority 
steps  in  to  elect  and  prescribe  one  of  those  ways  of 
action,  and  brand  the  others  as  illegitimate,  which 
would  otherwise  be  lawful.  This  is  called  the 
making  of  a  positive  law. 

Readings. — St.  Thos.,  la  2as,  q.  i8,  art.  5,  m 
Corp. ;  la  2as,  q.  71,  art.  2  ;  Plato,  Rep.,  588  b  to 
end  of  bk.  ix. ;  Ar.,  Eih.,  IX.,  iv.,  nn.  4 — 10 ;  Suarez, 


DUTY  AND  SIN.  115 


Dc  Legibus,  II.,  vi.,  nii.  4,  11 ;  Cicero,  De  Legibus,  i., 
cc.  15—17. 

Section  II. — Hoi^  Good  becomes  boundcn  Duty,  and 
Evil  is  advanced  to  Si)i. 

I.  The  great  problem  of  Moral  Philosophy  is  the 
e.xplanation  of  the  idea,  /  ought,  (c.  i.,  n.  6.)  We  are 
now  come  close  up  to  the  solution  of  that  problem. 
The  word  ought  denotes  the  necessary  bearing  of 
means  upon  end.  To  every  ought  there  is  a  pendent 
if.  The  means  ought  to  be  taken,  if  the  end  is  to  be 
secured.  Thus  we  say  :  '  You  ought  to  start  betimes 
if  you  are  to  catch  your  train.'  'You  ought  to 
study  harder,  if  you  are  to  pass  your  examination.' 
The  person  spoken  to  might  reply:  'But  what  if  I 
do  miss  my  train,  and  fail  in  my  examination  ?  '  He 
might  be  met  with  another  ought:  'You  ougJit  not 
to  miss  the  one,  if  you  are  to  keep  your  appoint- 
ment :  or  to  fail  in  the  other,  if  you  are  to  get  into 
a  profession.'  Thus  the  train  of  oughts  and  ifs 
extends,  until  we  come  finally  to  a  concatenation 
like  the  following:  'You  ought  not  to  break  your 
word,  or  to  give  needless  pain  to  your  parents,  if  you 
don't  want  to  do  violence  to  that  nature  which  is 
yours  as  a  reasonable  being,'  or  'to  thwart  your  own 
moral  development,' — and  so  on  in  a  variety  of 
phrases  descriptive  of  the  argument  of  the  last  section. 
Here  it  seems  the  chain  is  made  fast  to  a  staple  in 
the  wall.  If  a  person  goes  on  to  ask,  'Well,  what 
if  I  do  contradict  my  rational  self?' we  can  only 
tell  him  that  he  is  a  fool  for  his  question.  The 
oughts,    such    as    those   wherewith    our   illustration 


Ii6        OF  THE  ORIGIN  OF  MORAL   OBLIGATION. 

commenced,  Kant  calls  the  hypothetical  imperative^ 
the  form  being,  '  You  must,  unless  : '  but  the  ought 
wherein  it  terminated,  he  calls  the  categorical  impera- 
tive, the  alternative  being  such  as  no  rational  man 
can  accept,  and  therefore  no  alternative  at  all. 

2.  This  doctrine  of  the  Categorical  Imperative  is 
correct  and  valuable  so  far  as  it  goes.  But  then  it 
does  not  go  far  enough.  The  full  notion  of  what  a 
man  ought,  is  what  he  must  do  under  pain  of  sin.  Sin 
is  more  than  folly,  more  than  a  breach  of  reason. 
It  is  mild  reproach  to  a  great  criminal  to  tell  him 
that  he  is  a  very  foolish  person,  a  walking  unreason- 
ableness. If  he  chooses  to  contradict  his  rational 
self,  is  not  that  his  own  affair  ?  Is  he  not  his  own 
master,  and  may  he  not  play  the  fool  if  he  likes  ? 
The  answer  is,  '  No,  he  is  not  his  own  master ;  he 
is  under  law,  and  his  folly  and  self-abuse  becomes 
criminal  and  sinful,  by  being  in  contravention  of  the 
law  that  forbids  him  to  throw  himself  away  thus 
wantonly.' 

3.  Kant  readily  takes  up  this  idea,  shaping  it 
after  his  own  fashion.  He  contends, — and  herein 
his  doctrine  is  not  merely  deficient,  but  positively  in 
error, — that  the  Categorical  Imperative,  uttered  by  a 
man's  own  reason,  has  the  force  of  a  law,  made  by 
that  same  reason  ;  so  that  the  legislative  authority 
is  within  the  breast  of  the  doer,  who  owes  it  obedi- 
ence. This  he  calls  the  antonoiny  of  reason.  It  is 
also  called  Independent  Morality,  inasmuch  as  it 
establishes  right  and  wrong  without  regard  to 
external  authority,  or  to  the  consequences  of  actions, 
or  to  rewards  and  punishments.      The  doctrine  is 


DUTY   AND   SIN.  iij 


erroneous,  inasmuch  as  it  undertakes  to  settle  the 
matter  of  right  and  wrong  without  reference  to 
external  authority  ;  and  inasmuch  as  it  makes  the 
reason  within  a  man,  not  the  promulgator  of  the 
law  to  him,  but  his  own  legislator.  For  a  law  is  a 
precept,  a  command  :  now  no  one  issues  precepts,  or 
gives  commands,  to  himself.  To  command  is  an  act 
of  jurisdiction;  and  jurisdiction,  like  justice  (seec.  v., 
s.  ix.,  n.  I,  p.  102)  requires  a  distinction  of  persons, 
one  ruler,  and  another  subject.  But  the  reason  in  a 
man  is  not  a  distinct  subject  from  the  will,  appetites, 
or  other  faculties  within  him,  to  which  reason 
dictates  :  they  are  all  one  nature,  one  person,  one 
man ;  consequently,  no  one  of  them  can  strictly 
be  said  to  command  the  rest  ;  and  the  dictate  of 
reason,  as  emanating  from  within  oneself,  is  not  a 
law.  But  without  a  law,  there  is  no  strict  obliga- 
tion. Therefore  the  whole  theory  of  obligation  is 
not  locked  up  in  the  Categorical  Imperative,  as 
Kant  formulated  it. 

4.  The  above  argumentation  evinces  that  God  is 
not  under  any  law ;  for  there  is  no  other  God  above 
Him  to  command  Him.  As  for  the  ideas  of  what  is 
meet  and  just  in  the  Divine  intelligence,  though  the 
Divine  will,  being  a  perfect  will,  is  not  liable  to  act 
against  them,  yet  are  those  ideas  improperly  called 
a  law  to  the  Divine  will,  because  intellect  and  will 
are  identified  in  one  God.  Kant's  doctrine  makes 
us  all  gods.  It  is  a  deification  of  the  human  intellect, 
and  identification  of  that  intellect  with  the  supreme 
and  universal  Reason  ;  and  at  the  same  time  a 
release    of    the    human    will    from    all    authority 


xi8        OF   THE   ORIGIN   OF  MORAL   OBLIGATION. 


extraneous  to  the  individual.  This  amounts  to 
a  putting  off  of  all  authority  properl}'  so  called,  and 
makes  each  man  as  sovereign  and  unaccountable  as 
his  Maker.  "  Thy  heart  is  lifted  up,  and  thou  hast 
said  :  I  am  God,  and  sit  in  the  chair  of  God  :  and 
hast  set  thy  heart  as  if  it  were  the  heart  of  God  : 
whereas  thou  art  a  man  and  not  God."  (Ezech. 
Xxviii.  2.)  Kant  is  thus  the  father  of  the  pantheistic 
school  of  Fichte,  Schelling,  and  Hegel. 

5.  But  it  has  been  contended  that  this  phrase 
about  a  man  who  does  wrong  breaking  a  law,  is  only 
a  metaphor  and  figure  of  speech,  unless  it  be  used 
with  reference  to  the  enactment  of  some  civil  com- 
munity. Thus  John  Austin  says  that  a  natural  law 
is  a  law  which  is  not,  but  which  he  who  uses  the 
expression  thinks  ought  to  be  made.  At  this  rate 
sin  is  not  a  transgression  of  any  law,  except  so  far 
as  it  happens  to  be,  in  the  lawyer's  sense  of  the 
word,  a  crime,  or  something  punishable  in  a  human 
court  of  justice.  There  will  then  be  no  law  but 
man's  law.  How  then  am  I  obliged  to  obey  man's 
law  ?  Dr.  Bain  answers  :  "  Because,  if  you  disobey, 
you  will  he  punished ."  But  that  punishment  will  be 
either  just  or  unjust:  if  unjust,  it  originates  no 
obligation  :  if  just,  it  presupposes  an  obligation,  as 
it  presupposes  a  crime  and  sin,  that  is,  an  obligation 
violated.  There  seems  to  be  nothing  left  for  John 
Austin  but  to  fall  back  upon  Kant  and  his  Cate- 
gorical Imperative,  and  say  that  whoever  rebels 
against  the  duly  constituted  authority  of  the  State  in 
v.'hich  he  lives,  is  a  rebel  against  the  reason  that 
dwells  within  his  own  breast,  and  which   reauires 


DUTY    AND   SIN.  ii'U 


him  to  behave  like  a  citizen.  So  tliat  ultimately  it 
is  not  the  State,  but  his  own  reason  that  he  has 
offended  ;  and  the  State  has  no  authority  over  him 
except  what  his  own  reason  gives. 

6.  If  this  were  true,  there  would  be  no  sin  an}-- 
where  except  what  is  called  philosophical  sin,  that  is, 
a  breach  of  the  dignity  of  man's  rational  nature  ; 
and  the  hardest  thing  that  could  be  said  in  repro- 
bation of  a  wrongdoer,  would  be  that  he  had  gone 
against  himself,  and  against  his  fellow-men,  by  out- 
raging reason,  the  common  attribute  of  the  race. 

7.  Far  worse  than  that  has  the  sinner  done.  He 
has  offended  against  his  own  reason,  and  thereby 
against  a  higher  Reason,  substantially  distinct  from 
his,  standing  to  it  in  the  relation  of  Archetype  to 
type,  a  Living  Reason,  efx-\\rv^o<i  \6'yo<i  (cf.  Ar.,  Eth., 
v.,  iv.,  7),  purely  and  supremely  rational.  The 
Archet}'pe  is  outraged  by  the  violation  of  the  type. 
Moreover,  as  the  two  are  substantially  distinct,  the 
one  being  God,  the  other  a  faculty  of  man,  there  is 
room  for  a  command,  for  law.  A  man  may  trans- 
gress and  sin,  in  more  than  the  pJiilosophical  sense 
of  the  word  :  he  may  be  properly  a  laiv-brcahcr,  by 
offending  against  this  supreme  Reason,  higher  and 
other  than  his  own. 

8.  Here  we  must  pause  and  meditate  a  parable. 
— There  was  a  certain  monastery  where  the  monks 
lived  in  continual  violation  of  monastic  observance. 
Their  Abbot  was  a  holy  man,  a  model  of  what  a 
monk  ought  to  be.  But  though  perfectly  cognisant 
of  the  delinquencies  of  his  community,  he  was  con- 
tent to  display  to  his  subjects  the  edifying  example 


120         UI'    THE   ORiGlN    OF  MORAL   OBLIGATION. 

of  his  own  life,  and  to  let  it  appear  that  he  was  aware 
of  their  doings  and  pained  at  them.  He  would  croon 
softly  as  he  went  about  the  house  old  Hell's  words : 
**  Not  so,  my  sons,  not  so  :  why  do  ye  these  kind  oi 
things,  very  wicked  things  ?  "  But  the  monks  took 
no  notice  of  him.  It  happened  in  course  of  time 
that  the  Abbot  went  away  for  about  ten  days.  What 
he  did  in  that  time,  never  transpired :  though  there 
was  some  whisper  of  certain  "  spiritual  exercises," 
which  he  was  said  to  have  been  engaged  in.  Certain 
it  is,  that  he  returned  to  his  monastery,  as  he  left 
it,  a  monk  devout  and  regular  :  the  monk  was  the 
same,  but  the  Abbot  was  mightily  altered.  The 
morning  after  his  arrival,  a  Chapter  was  held  ;  the 
Abbot  had  the  Rule  read  from  cover  to  cover,  and 
announced  his  intention  of  enforcing  the  same. 
And  he  was  as  good  as  his  word.  Transgressions 
of  course  abounded :  but  the  monks  discovered 
that  to  transgress  was  quite  a  different  thing  now 
from  what  it  had  been.  Seeing  the  law  proclaimed, 
and  the  Abbot  in  earnest  to  enforce  it,  they  too 
reformed  themselves :  the  few  who  would  not  reform, 
had  to  lea\'e.  The  subsequent  holy  lives  of  those 
monks  do  not  enter  into  this  history. 

9.  Now,  we  might  fancy  God  our  Lord  like  the 
Abbot  of  that  monastery  in  the  early  years  of  his 
rule.  We  might  fancy  the  Supreme  Reason,  dis- 
pleased indeed,  as  Reason  must  be,  at  the  excesses 
and  follies  of  mankind,  but  not  otherwise  com- 
manding men  to  avoid  those  evil  courses.  Were 
God  to  be  thus  quiescent,  what  we  have  called  (n.  6) 
philosophical  sin,  would  indeed  carry  this  additional 


DUTY   AND   SIN.  121 

malice,  beyond  uluit  was  there  set  down,  of  being 
an  offence  aj^ainst  God,  but  it  would  not  be  a 
grievous  offence :  for  it  would  not  be  a  sin  in  the 
proper  sense  of  the  term,  not  being  a  transgression 
of  the  law  of  God,  inasmuch  as  God,  by  the  suppo- 
sition, would  have  given  no  law.  But  the  supposition 
itself  is  absurd.  God  could  not  so  withhold  His 
command.  He  is  free  indeed  not  to  command,  but 
that  only  by  not  creating.  If  He  wills  to  have 
creatures.  He  must  likewise  will  to  bind  them  to 
certain  lines  of  action :  which  will  to  bind  in  God  is 
a  law  to  the  creature. 

10.  This  assertion,  that  God  cannot  but  will  to  bind 
His  crcalures  to  certain  lines  of  action,  must  be  proved, 
though  in  the  ascent  we  have  to  mount  to  high 
regions,  and  breathe  those  subtle  airs  that  are 
wafted  round  the  throne  of  the  Eternal.  As  God 
is  the  one  source  of  all  reality  and  of  all  power, 
not  only  can  there  be  no  being  which  He  has  not 
created  and  does  not  still  preserve,  but  no  action 
either  can  take  place  without  His  concurrence.  God 
must  go  with  His  every  creature  in  its  every  act : 
otherwise,  on  the  creature's  part,  nothing  could  be 
done.  Now,  God  cannot  be  indifferent  what  manner 
of  act  He  shall  concur  unto.  A  servant  or  a  subject 
may  be  indifferent  what  command  he  receives :  he 
may  will  simply  to  obey, — to  go  here  or  there,  as  he 
is  bid,  or  to  be  left  without  orders  where  he  is. 
That  is  because  he  leaves  the  entire  direction  and 
management  of  the  household  to  his  master.  But 
for  God  to  be  thus  indifferent  what  action  He  should 
lend    Plis   concurrence   to,  would   be  to  forego   all 


122        OF  THE  ORIGIN  OF  MORAL  OBLIGATION. 

design  and  purpose  of  His  own  as  to  the  use  and 
destiny  of  the  creatures  which  He  has  made  and 
continually  preserves.  This  God  cannot  do,  for  He 
cannot  act  aimlessly.  It  would  be  renouncing  the 
direction  of  His  own  work,  and  making  the  creature 
His  superior.  God  is  incapable  of  such  renunciation 
and  subservience.  He  must,  then,  will  the  coopera- 
tion which  He  lends,  and  the  concurrent  action  of 
the  creature,  to  take  a  certain  course,  regulated  and 
prescribed  by  Himself:  which  is  our  proposition, 
that  God  cannot  but  will  to  bind  His  creatures 
to  certain  lines  of  action.  If  His  free  creatures 
choose  to  stray  from  these  lines,  God  indeed 
still  cooperates,  and  to  His  cooperation  is  to  be 
ascribed  the  physical  goodness  of  the  action,  not  its 
moral  inordinatcncss  and  inopporfunencss.  Still,  as  the 
action  is  morally  inordinate,  God  may  be  said  to 
cooperate,  in  a  manner,  where  He  would  not : 
whence  we  gather  some  conception  of  the  enormity 
of  sin.  (See  c.  vii.,  nn.  5,  6,  pp.  130,  131.) 

11.  The  lines  of  action  laid  down  and  prescribed 
by  God  are  not  arbitrary  and  irrespective  of  the 
subject  of  the  command.  They  are  determined  in 
each  case  by  the  nature  of  the  subject.  The  Author 
of  Nature  is  not  apt  to  subvert  that  order  which 
proceeds  from  Himself.  He  bids  every  creature  act 
up  to  that  nature  wherein  He  has  created  it.  ?Iis 
commands  follow  the  line  of  natural  exigency. 
What  this  natural  exigency  amounts  to  in  man  in 
regard  to  his  human  acts,  we  have  already  seen, 
(c.  vi.,  s.  i.,  p.  log.) 

12.  The  difference  between  a  necessary  and  a  free 


DUTY   AND   SIN.  123 


agent  is,  that  the  former  is  determined  by  its  nature 
to  act  in  a  certain  way,  and  cannot  act  otherwise : 
the  latter  may  act  in  more  ways  than  one.  Still,  as 
we  have  seen,  the  nature  even  of  a  free  agent  is  not 
indifferent  to  all  manner  of  action.  It  requires, 
though  it  docs  not  constrain,  the  agent  to  act  in 
certain  definite  ways,  the  ways  of  moral  goodness. 
Acting  otherwise,  as  he  may  do,  the  free  agent  gain- 
says his  own  nature,  taken  as  a  whole,  a  thing  that 
a  necessary  agent  can  nowise  do.  God  therefore 
who,  as  we  have  shown,  wills  and  commands  all 
creatures  whatsoever  to  act  on  the  lines  of  their 
nature,  has  especial  reason  to  give  this  command  to 
His  rational  creatures,  with  whom  alone  rests  the 
momentous  freedom  to  disobey. 

13.  We  are  now  abreast  of  the  question,  of  such 
burning  interest  in  these  days,  as  to  the  connection 
of  Ethics  with  Theology,  or  of  Morality  with  Religion. 
I  will  not  enquire  whether  the  dogmatic  atheist  is 
logically  consistent  in  maintaining  any  distinction 
between  right  and  wrong:  happily,  dogmatic  atheists 
do  not  abound.  But  there  are  many  who  hold  that, 
whether  there  be  a  God  or  no,  the  fact  ought  not  to 
be  imported  into  Moral  Science :  that  a  Professor  oi 
Ethics,  as  such,  has  no  business  with  the  name  of 
the  Almighty  on  his  lips,  any  more  than  a  lecturer 
on  Chemistry  or  Fortification.  This  statement 
must  be  at  once  qualified  by  an  important  proviso. 
If  we  have  any  duties  of  worship  and  praise  towards 
our  Maker:  if  there  is  such  a  virtue  as  religion,  and 
such  a  sin  as  blasphemy :  surely  a  Professor  of 
Morals  must  point  that  out.     He  cannot  in  that  case 


124        OF   THE   ORIGIN   OF  MORAL   OBLIGATION. 

suppress  all  reference  to  God,  for  the  same  reason 
that  he  cannot  help  going  into  the  duties  of  a  man 
to  his  wife,  or  of  an  individual  to  the  State,  if 
marriage  and  civil  government  are  natural  institu- 
tions. If  there  is  a  God  to  be  worshipped,  any  book 
on  Moral  Science  is  incomplete  without  a  chapter 
on  Religion.  But  the  question  remains,  whether 
the  name  of  God  should  enter  into  the  other 
chapters,  and  His  being  and  authority  into  the  very 
foundations  of  the  science.  I  do  not  mean  the  meta- 
physical foundations ;  for  Metaphysics  are  like  a 
two-edged  sword,  that  cleaves  down  to  the  very 
marrow  of  things,  and  must  therefore  reveal  and 
discover  God.  But  Morality,  Hke  Mathematics, 
takes  certain  metaphysical  foundations  for  granted, 
without  enquiring  into  them.  On  these  foundations 
we  rear  the  walls,  so  to  speak,  of  the  science  of 
Ethics  without  reference  to  God,  but  we  cannot  put 
the  roof  and  crown  upon  the  erection,  unless  we 
speak  of  Him  and  of  His  law.  Moral  distinctions,  as 
we  saw  (c.  vi.,  s.  i.  n.  7,  p.  113),  are  antecedent  to  the 
Divine  command  to  observe  them  :  and  though  they 
rest  ultimately  on  the  Divine  nature,  that  ultimate 
ground  belongs  to  Metaphysics,  not  to  Ethics.  Ethics 
begin  with  human  nature,  pointing  out  that  there 
are  certain  human  acts  that  do  become  a  man,  and 
others  that  do  not.  (c.vi.,s.i.,  p.  log.)  To  see  this,  it  is 
not  necessary  to  look  up  above  man.  Thus  we  shall 
prove  lying,  suicide,  and  murder  to  be  wrong,  and 
good  fellowship  a  duty,  without  needing  to  mention 
the  Divine  Being,  though  by  considering  Him  the 
proof  gains  in  cogency.     Or  rather,  apart  from  God 


DUTY   AND   SIN.  125 


we  shall  prove  certain  acts  wrong,  and  other  acts 
obligatory  as  duties,  philosophically  speaking,  with  an 
initial  and  fundamental  wrongness  and  obligation. 
In  the  present  section  we  have  proved  once  for  all, 
that  what  is  wrong  philosophically,  or  is  philo- 
sophically a  duty,  is  the  same  also  theologically. 
Thus  the  initial  and  fundamental  obligation  is 
transformed  into  an  obligation  formal  and  complete. 
Therefore,  hereafter  we  shall  be  content  to  have 
established  the  philosophical  obligation,  knowing 
that  the  theological  side  is  invariably  conjoined 
therewith.  As  St.  Thomas  says  (la  2ae,  q.  71, 
art.  6,  ad  5)  :  "  By  theologians  sin  is  considered 
principally  as  it  is  an  offence  against  God :  but  by 
the  moral  philosopher,  inasmuch  as  it  is  contrary  to 
reason."  But  what  is  contrary  to  reason  offends 
God,  and  is  forbidden  by  Divine  law,  and  thus 
becomes  a  sin.  No  God,  no  sin.  Away  from  God, 
there  is  mdeccncy  and  impropriety,  unreasonableness , 
abomination,  and  brutality,  all  this  in  view  of  outraged 
humanity:  there  is  likewise  crime  against  the  State: 
but  the  formal  element  of  sin  is  wanting.  With  sin, 
of  course,  disappears  also  the  punishment  of  sin  as 
such.  Thus  to  leave  God  wholly  out  of  Ethics  and 
Natural  Law,  is  to  rob  moral  evil  of  half  its  terrors, 
and  of  that  very  half  which  is  more  easily  "  under- 
standed  of  the  people."  A  consideration  for  school- 
managers. 

Readings. — St.  Thos.,  la,  q.  22,  art.  2,  in  corp. 
(against  Lucretius,  ii.  646 — 651) ;  Suarez,  DeLegibus, 
IL,  vi.,  nn.  3,  5—9,  13,  14,  17,  20—24. 


CHAPTER    VII. 

OF    THE    ETEKNAL    LAW. 

I.  A  LAW  is  defined  to  be  :  A  precept  just  and 
abiding,  given  for  promulgation  to  a  perfect  com- 
munity. A  law  is  primarily  a  rule  of  action.  The 
first  attribute  of  a  law  is  that  it  be  jtist :  just  to 
the  subject  on  whom  it  is  imposed,  as  being  no 
harmful  abridgment  of  his  rights :  just  also  to 
other  men,  as  not  moving  him  to  injustice  against 
them.  An  unjust  law  is  no  law  at  all,  for  it  is 
not  a  rule  of  action.  Still,  we  may  sometimes 
be  bound,  when  only  our  own  rights  are  infringed, 
to  submit  to  such  an  imposition,  not  as  a  law, 
for  it  is  none,  but  on  the  score  of  prudence,  to 
escape  direr  evils.  A  law  is  no  fleeting,  occasional 
rule  of  conduct,  suited  to  meet  some  passing  emer- 
gency or  superficial  disturbance.  The  reason  of  a 
law  lies  deep  down,  lasting  and  widespread  in  the 
nature  of  the  governed.  A  law,  then,  has  these  two 
*  further  attributes  of  permanence  in  duration  and 
amplitude  in  area.  Every  law  is  made  for  all  time, 
and  lives  on  with  the  life  of  the  community  for  whom 
it  is  enacted,  for  ever,  unless  it  be  either  expressly 
or  implicitly  repealed.  A  law  in  a  community  is  like 
a  habit  in  an  individual,  an  accretion  to  nature, 
which  abides  as  part  of  the  natural  being,  and  guides 


OF  THE   ETERNAL   LAW.  127 

henceforth  the  course  of  natural  action.  This 
analogy  holds  especially  of  those  laws,  which  are  not 
enacted  all  of  a  sudden — and  such  are  rarely  the 
best  laws — but  grow  upon  the  people  with  gradual 
growth  unmarked,  like  a  habit  by  the  repetition  of 
acts,  in  the  way  of  immemorial  custom.  I  have  said 
that  a  law  is  for  a  community,  that  it  requires  ampli- 
tude and  large  area.  A  law  is  not  laid  down  for  an 
individual,  except  so  far  as  his  action  is  of  importance 
to  the  community.  The  private  concerns  of  one 
man  do  not  afford  scope  and  room  enough  for  a  law. 
Neither  do  the  domestic  affairs  of  one  family.  A 
father  is  not  a  legislator.  A  law  aims  at  a  deep, 
far-reaching,  primary  good.  But  the  private  good 
of  an  individual,  and  the  domestic  good  of  a  family, 
are  not  primary  goods,  inasmuch  as  the  individual 
and  the  family  are  not  primary  but  subordinate 
beings  :  not  complete  and  independent,  but  depen- 
dent and  partial ;  not  wholes  but  parts.  The  indi- 
vidual is  part  of  the  family,  and  the  family  is  part  of 
a  higher  community.  It  is  only  when  we  are  come 
to  some  community  which  is  not  part  of  any  higher, 
that  we  have  found  the  being,  the  good  of  which  is 
primary  good,  the  aim  of  law.  Such  a  community, 
not  being  part  of  any  higher  community  in  the  same 
order,  is  in  its  own  order  a  perfect  community. 
Thus,  in  the  temporal  order,  the  individual  is  part  of 
the  State.  The  State  is  a  perfect  community ;  and 
the  good  of  the  State  is  of  more  consequence  than 
the  temporal  well-being  of  any  individual  citizen. 
The  temporal  good  of  the  individual,  then,  is  matter 
of  law,  in  so  far  as  it  is  subservient  to  the  good  of 


t28  OF  THE   ETERNAL   LAW. 

the  State.  We  have,  then,  to  hold  that  a  law  is 
given  to  the  members  of  a  perfect  community  for  the 
good  of  the  whole.  Not  every  precept,  therefore,  is 
a  law :  nor  every  superior  a  lawgiver :  for  it  is  not 
every  superior  that  has  charge  of  the  good  of  a 
perfect  community.  Many  a  precept  is  given  to  an 
individual,  either  for  his  private  good,  as  when  a 
father  commands  his  child,  or  for  the  private  good 
of  him  that  issues  the  precept,  as  when  a  master 
commands  a  servant.  But  every  law  is  a  precept : 
for  a  law  is  an  imperative  rule  of  action,  in  view  of 
a  good  that  is  necessary,  at  least  with  the  necessity 
of  convenience.  To  every  law  there  are  counsels 
attached.  A  law  may  be  said  to  be  a  nucleus  of  pre- 
cept, having  an  envelope  of  counsel.  Every  law  has 
also  a  pendent  called  punishment  for  those  who 
break  it :  this  is  called  the  sanction  of  the  law.  A  law 
is  also  iox  promidgation,  as  a  birch  rod  for  application. 
The  promulgation,  or  application,  brings  the  law 
home  to  the  subject,  but  is  not  part  of  the  law  itself. 
So  much  for  the  definition  of  Law. 

2.  We  have  to  learn  to  look  upon  the  whole 
created  universe,  and  the  fulness  thereof,  angels, 
men,  earth,  sun,  planets,  fixed  stars,  all  things  visible 
and  invisible,  as  one  great  and  perfect  community, 
whose  King  and  Lawgiver  is  God.  He  is  King, 
because  He  is  Creator  and  Lord.  But  lordship  and 
kingship  are  different  things,  even  in  God,  It  is  one 
thing  to  be  lord  and  master,  owner  and  proprietor  of 
a  chattel,  property  and  domain:  it  is  another  thing 
to  be  king  and  governor,  lawgiver  and  judge  of 
political    subjects.     The   former   is  called   power  oj 


OF   THE   ETERNAL   LAW.  .  ,  ;i'9 

dominion,  or  right  of  ownership,  the  latter  is  power  oj 
jurisdiction.  Power  of  dominion  is  for  the  good  of 
him  who  wields  it:  but  power  of  jurisdiction  is  for 
the  good  of  the  governed.  As  God  is  Lord  of  the 
universe,  He  directs  all  its  operations  to  His  own 
glory.  As  He  is  King,  He  governs  as  a  king  should 
govern,  for  the  good  of  His  subjects.  In  intellectual 
creatures,  whose  will  is  not  set  in  opposition  to  God, 
the  subject's  good  and  the  glory  of  the  Lord  finally 
coincide.  God's  power  of  dominion  is  the  concern 
of  theologians:  the  moralist  is  taken  up  with  His 
power  of  jurisdiction,  from  whence  emanates  the 
moral  law. 

3.  In  the  last  chapter  (s.  ii.,  nn.  g,  10,  pp.  120,121), 
we  stated  the  moral  law  in  these  terms,  that  God 
wills  to  bind  His  creatures  to  certain  lilies  of  action,  not 
arbitrary  lines,  as  we  saw,  but  the  natural  lines  of 
each  creature's  being.  The  law  thus  stated  takes  in 
manifestly  a  wider  field  than  that  of  moral  action. 
There  is  in  fact  no  action  of  created  things  that  is 
not  comprehended  under  this  statement.  It  com- 
prises the  laws  of  physical  nature  and  the  action  of 
physical  causes,  no  less  than  the  moral  law  and 
human  acts.  It  is  the  one  primeval  law  of  the 
universe,  antecedent  to  all  actual  creation,  and  co- 
eternal  with  God.  And  yet  not  necessary  as  God : 
for  had  God  not  decreed  from  all  eternity  to  create 
— and  He  need  not  have  decreed  it — neither  would 
He  have  passed  in  His  pwn  Divine  Mind  this  second 
decree,  necessarily  corisequent  as  it  is  upon  the 
decree  of  creation,  namely,  that  every  creature 
should  act  in  the  mode  of  action  proper  of  its  kind 
J 


"U- 


I30  OF  THE   ETERNAL   LAW. 

This    decreej   supervening   from    eternity  upon    the 
creative  decree,  is  called  the  Eternal  Law. 

4.  This  law  does  not  govern  the  acts  of  God 
Himself.  God  ever  does  what  is  wise  and  good,  not 
because  He  binds  Himself  by  the  decree  of  His  own 
will  so  to  act,  but  because  of  His  all-perfect  nature. 
His  own  decrees  have  not  for  Him  the  force  of  a 
precept :  that  is  impossible  in  any  case :  yet  He 
cannot  act  against  them,  as  His  nature  allows  not  of 
irresolution,  change  of  mind,  and  inconsistency. 

5.  Emanating  from  the  will  of  God,  and  resting 
upon  the  nature  of  the  creature,  it  would  seem  that 
the  Eternal  Law  must  be  irresistible.  **  Who  re- 
sisteth  His  will  ?"  asks  the  Apostle.  (Rom.  ix.  ig.) 
"  The  streams  of  sacred  rivers  are  flowing  upwards, 
and  justice  and  the  universal  order  is  wrenched 
back."  (Euripides,  Medea,  499.)  It  is  only  the  per- 
version spoken  of  by  the  poet,  that  can  anywise 
supply  the  instance  asked  for  by  the  Apostle.  The 
thing  is  impossible  in  the  physical  order.  The 
rivers  cannot  flow  upwards,  under  the  conditions 
under  which  rivers  usually  flow :  but  justice  and 
purity,  truth  and  religion  may  be  wrenched  back,  in 
violation  of  nature  and  of  the  law  eternal.  The  one 
thing  that  breaks  this  law  is  sin.  Sin  alone  is  pro- 
perly unnatural.  The  world  is  full  of  physical  evils, 
pain,  famine,  blindness,  disease,  decay  and  death. 
But  herein  is  nothing  against  nature :  the  several 
agents  act  up  to  their  nature,  so  far  as  it  goes  :  it  is 
the  defect  of  nature  that  makes  the  evil.  But  sin  is 
no  mere  shortcoming:  it  is  a  turning  round  and 
j^oing  against  nature,  as  though  the  July  sun  should 


OF  THE   ETERNAL   LA  IV.  131 

freeze  a  man,  or  the  summer  air  suffocate  him. 
Physical  evil  comes  by  the  defect  of  nature,  and  by 
permission  of  the  Eternal  Law.  But  the  moral  evil 
of  sin  is  a  breach  of  that  law. 

5.  A  great  point  with  modern  thinkers  is  the 
inviolability  of  the  laws  of  physical  nature,  e.g.,  of 
gravitation  or  of  electrical  induction.  If  these  laws 
are  represented,  as  J.  S,  Mill  said  they  should  be,  as 
tendencies  only,  they  are  truly  inviolable.  The  law  of 
gravitation  is  equally  fulfilled  in  a  falling  body,  in  a 
body  suspended  by  a  string,  and  in  a  body  borne  up 
by  the  ministry  of  an  angel.  There  is  no  law  of 
nature  to  the  effect  that  a  supernatural  force  shall 
never  intervene.  Even  if,  as  may  be  done  perhaps 
in  the  greatest  miracles,  God  suspends  His  con- 
currence, so  that  the  creature  acts  not  at  all,  even 
that  would  be  no  violation  of  the  physical  law  of 
the  creature's  action  :  for  all  that  such  a  law  provides 
is,  that  the  creature,  if  it  acts  at  all,  shall  act  in  a 
certain  way,  not  that  God  shall  always  give  the  con- 
currence which  is  the  necessary  condition  of  its 
acting  at  all.  The  laws  of  physical  nature  then 
are,  strictly  speaking,  never  violated,  although  the 
course  of  nature  is  occasionally  altered  by  super- 
natural interference,  and  continually  by  free  human 
volition.  But  the  laws  of  physical  nature,  in  the 
highest  generality,  are  identified  with  the  moral  law. 
The  one  Eternal  Law  embraces  all  the  laws  of 
creation.  It  has  a  physical  and  a  moral  side.  On 
the  former  it  effects,  on  the  latter  it  obliges,  but  on 
both  sides  it  is  imperative ;  and  though  in  moral 
matters  it  be  temporarily  defeated  by  sin,  still  the 


132  OF   TH£   ETERNAL   LAW. 

moral  behest  must  in  the  end  be  fulfilled  as  surely  as 
the  physical  behest.  The  defeat  of  tl;c  law  must 
be  made  good,  the  sin  must  be  punished.  Of  the 
Eternal  Law  working  itself  out  in  the  form  of  punish- 
ment, we  shall  speak  presently. 

7.  It  is  important  to  hold  this  conception  of  the 
Eternal  Law  as  embracing  physical  nature  along 
with  rational  agents.  To  confine  the  law,  as  modern 
writers  do,  to  rational  agents  alone,  is  sadly  to 
abridge  the  view  of  its  binding  force.  The  rigid 
application  of  physical  laws  is  brought  home  to  us 
daily  by  science  and  by  experience :  it  is  a  point 
gained,  to  come  to  understand  that  the  moral 
law,  being  ultimately  one  with  those  physical  laws, 
is  no  less  absolute  and  indefeasible,  though  in  a 
different  manner,  than  they. 

It  is  hard  for  us  to  conceive  of  laws  being  given  to 
senseless  things.  We  cannot  ourselves  prescribe  to 
iron  or  to  sulphur  the  manner  of  its  action.  As 
Bacon  says  {Novum  Orgamun,  i.,  Aphorism  4) :  "  Man 
can  only  put  natural  bodies  together  or  asunder : 
nature  does  the  rest  within."  That  is,  man  cannot 
make  the  laws  of  nature :  he  can  only  arrange  collo- 
cations of  materials  so  as  to  avail  himself  of  those 
laws.  But  God  makes  the  law,  issuing  His  com- 
mand, the  warrant  without  which  no  creature  could 
do  an}thing,  that  every  creature,  rational  and 
irrational,  shall  act  each  according  to  its  kind  or 
nature.     Such  is  the  Eternal  Law. 

Readings, — Suarez,  De  Legihus,  I.,  xii. ;  St.  Thos., 
la  2a;,  q.  qo,  art.  2 — 4  ;  ih.,  q.  gi,  art.  i,  in  Corp.,  ad  i ; 
ib.,  q.  93,  art.  i,  in  corp. ;    ib.,  q.  93,  art.  4,  in  corp.  ; 


ORIGIN   OF   PRIMARY  MORAL  JUDGMENTS        13} 

ib..q.  93,  art.  5,  in  corp.  ;  ib.,  q.  93,  art.  6,  in  corp. ; 
Siiarcz,  Dc  Lcf^ibns,  TI.,  vi.;  Cicero,  Dc  Legibus,  II., 
iv. ;  id.,  Dc  Rfpnblica,  iii.  22. 


CHAPTER   VIII. 

OF    THE    NATUKAL    LAW   OF   CONSCIENCE. 

Section  I. — Of  the  Ori'^m  of  Primary  Moral  Judgments. 

I.  It  is  an  axiom  of  the  schools,  that  whatever  is 
received,  is  received  according  to  the  manner  of 
the  recipient.  \\c  have  spoken  of  the  law  that 
governs  the  world,  as  that  law  has  existed  from 
eternity  in  the  mind  of  God.  We  have  now  to  con- 
sider that  law  as  it  is  received  in  creatures,  and 
becotnes  the  inward  determinant  of  their  action. 
Action  is  cither  necessary  or  free.  The  great  multi- 
tude of  creatures  are  wholly  necessary  agents.  Even 
in  free  agents,  most  of  what  is  in  them,  and  much 
that  proceeds  from  them,  is  of  necessity,  and  beyond 
the  control  of  their  will.  Of  necessary  action, 
whether  material  or  mental,  we  shall  have  nothing 
further  to  say.  It  is  governed  by  the  Eternal  Law, 
but  it  is  not  matter  of  moral  philosophy.  Hence- 
forth we  have  to  .do  with  that  law,  only  as  it  is 
received  in  free  agents,  as  such,  to  be  the  rule  of 
their  conduct.  The  agents  being  free,  the  law  must 
be  received  in  a  manner  consonant  with -their  free- 
dom. It  is  proper  to  a  free  and  rational  being  to 
guide  itself,    not  to    be    dragged  or  pushed,  but  to 


134        <5F   THE   NATURAL  LAW   OF  CONSCIENCE. 

po  its  own  way,  yet  not  arbitrarily,  but  according 
to  law.  The  law  for  such  a  creature  must  be,  not 
a  physical  determinant  of  its  action,  but  a  law 
operating  in  the  manner  of  a  motive  to  the  will, 
obliging  and  binding,  yet  not  constraining  it :  a  law 
written  in  the  intellect  after  the  manner  of  know- 
ledge :  a  law  within  the  mind  and  consciousness  of 
the  creature,  whereby  it  shall  measure  and  regulate 
its  own  behaviour.  This  is  the  natural  law  of  con- 
science. It  is  the  Eternal  Law,  as  made  known  to 
the  rational  creature,  whereby  to  measure  its  own 
free  acts.  The  Eternal  Law  is  in  the  Mind  of  God : 
the  Natural  Law  in  the  minds  of  men  and  angels. 
The  Eternal  Law  adjusts  all  the  operations  of 
creatures:  the  Natural  Law,  only  the  free  acts  of 
intellectual  creatures.  And  yet,  for  binding  force, 
the  Natural  Law  is  one  with  the  Eternal  Law.  On 
a  summer  evening  one  observes  the  sunset  on  the 
west  coast ;  the  heavens  are  all  aglow  with  the  sun 
shining  there,  and  the  waters  are  aglow  too,  reflect- 
ing the  sun's  rays.  The  Eternal  Law  is  as  the  sun 
there  in  the  heavens,  the  Natural  Law  is  like  the 
reflection  in  the  sea.     But  it  is  one  light. 

2.  It  is  called  the  Natural  Law,  first,  because  it 
is  found,  more  or  less  perfectly  expressed,  in  all 
rational  beings :  now  whatever  is  found  in  all  the 
individuals  of  a  kind,  is  taken  to  belong  to  the  specific 
nature,  or  type  of  that  kind.  Again  it  is  called  the 
Natural  Laze),  because  it  is  a  thing  which  any  rational 
nature  must  necessarily  compass  and  contain  within 
itself  in  order  to  arrive  at  its  own  proper  perfection 
and   maturity.     Thus  this   inner  law  is  natural,  in 


ORIGIN   OF  PRIMARY  MORAL   JUDGMENTS.        135 

the  sense  in  which  walking,  speech,  civiHzation  are 
natural  to  man.  A  man  who  has  it  not,  is  below  the 
standard  of  his  species.  It  will  be  seen  that  dancing, 
singing — at  least  to  a  pitch  of  professional  excellence 
— and  a  knowledge  of  Greek,  are  not,  in  this  sense* 
natural.  The  Natural  Law  is  not  natural,  in  the 
sense  of  "  coming  natural,"  as  provincial  people  say, 
or  coming  to  be  in  man  quite  irrespectively  of  train- 
ing and  education,  as  comes  the  power  of  breathing. 
It  was  absurd  of  Paley  {Mor.  Phil.,  bk.  i.,  c.  v.)  to  look 
to  the  wild  boy  of  Hanover,  who  had  grown  up  in 
the  woods  by  himself,  to  display  in  his  person  either 
the  Natural  Law  or  any  other  attribute  proper  to  a 
rational  creature. 

3.  We  call  this  the  natural  law  of  conscience, 
because  every  individual's  conscience  applies  this 
law,  as  he  understands  it,  to  his  own  particular 
human  acts,  and  judges  of  their  morality  accordingly. 
What  then  is  conscience  ?  It  is  not  a  faculty,  not  a 
habit,  it  is  an  act.  It  is  a  practical  judgment  of  the 
understanding.  It  is  virtually  the  conclusion  of  a 
syllogism,  the  major  premiss  of  which  would  be  some 
general  principle  of  command  or  counsel  in  moral 
matters ;  the  minor,  a  statement  of  fact  bringing 
some  particular  case  of  your  own  conduct  under 
that  law ;  and  the  conclusion,  which  is  conscience, 
a  decision  of  the  case  for  yourself  according  to  that 
principle :  e.g.,  *  There  is  no  obligation  of  going  to 
church  on  (what  Catholics  call)  a  day  of  devotion: 
this  day  I  am  now  living  is  only  a  day  of  devotion ; 
therefore  I  am  not  bound  to  go  to  church  to-day.' 
Such  is  the  train  of  thought,  not  always  so  explicitly 


136        OF  THE   NATURAL   LAW  OF  CONSCIENCE. 


and  formally  developed,  that  passes  through  the 
mind,  when  conscience  works.  It  is  important  to 
remember  that  conscience  is  an  act  of  intellect,  a 
judgment,  not  on  a  matter  of  general  principle,  not 
about  other  people's  conduct,  but  about  my  own 
action  in  some  particular  case,  and  the  amount  of 
moral  praise  or  blame  that  I  deserve,  or  should 
deserve,  for  it.  As  regards  action  already  done, 
or  not  done,  conscience  testifies,  accusing  or  excusing. 
As  regards  action  contemplated,  conscience  restrains 
oi  prompts,  in  the  way  of  either  obligation  or  counsel. 
^  4.  Conscience  is  not  infallible :    it  may  err,  like 

^  any  other  human  judgment.  A  man  may  be  blind, 
if  not  exactly  to  his  own  action,  at  least  to  the 
motives  and  circumstances  of  his  action.  He  may 
have  got  hold  of  a  wrong  general  principle  of  con- 
duct. He  may  be  in  error  as  to  the  application  of 
his  principle  to  the  actual  facts.  In  all  these  ways, 
what  we  may  call  the  conscientious  syllogism  may  be 
at  fault,  like  any  other  syllogism.  It  may  be  a  bad 
syllogism,  either  in  logical  form,  or  in  the  matter  of 
fact  asserted  in  the  premisses.  This  is  an  erroneous 
conscience.  But,  for  action  contemplated,  even  an 
erroneous  conscience  is  an  authoritative  decision. 
If  it  points  to  an  obligation,  however  mistakenly, 
we  are  bound  either  to  act  upon  the  judgment  or  get 
it  reversed.  We  must  not  contradict  our  own  reason : 
such  contradiction  is  moral  evil.  (c.  v.,  s.  iii.,  n.  3,  p.  74.) 
•  "^  If  conscience  by  mistake  sets  us  free  of  what  is 
objectively  our  bounden  duty,  we  are  not  there  and 
then  bound  to  that  duty :  but  we  may  be  bound  at 
once  to  get  that  verdict  of  conscience  overhauled  and 


ORIGIN   OF  I'RIMARY   MORAL  JUDGMENTS.        137 


reconsidered.  Conscience  in  tins  case  has  proceeded 
in  ignorance,  which  ignorance  will  be  either  vincible 
or  invincible,  and  must  be  treated  according  to  the 
rules  provided  in  the  matter  of  ignorance,  (c.  iii.,  s.  i., 
nn.  3 — 5,  p.  27.)  An  obligation,  neglected  in  invin- 
cible ignorance,  makes  a  merely  inaterial  sin.  (c.  iii., 
s.  ii.,  n.  7,  p.  33.) 

5.  There  is  another  element  of  mind,  often  con- 
founded under  one  name  with  conscience,  but  distinct 
from  it,  as  a  habit  from  an  act,  and  as  principles 
from  their  application.  This  element  the  schoolmen 
called  synderesis.* 

Symderesis  is  an  habitual  hold  upon  primary  moral 
judgments,  as,  that  we  must  do  good,  avoid  evil, 
requite  benefactors,  honour  superiors,  punish  evil- 
doers. There  is  a  hot  controversy  as  to  how  these 
primary  moral  judgments  arise  in  the  mind.  The 
coals  of  dispute  are  kindled  by  the  assumption,  that 
these  moral  judgments  must  needs  have  a  totally 
other  origin  and  birth  in  the  mind  than  speculative 
first  principles,  as,  that  the  whole  is  greater  than  the 
part,  that  two  and  two  are  four,  that  things  which 
are  equal  to  the  same  thing  are  equal  to  one  another. 
The  assumption  is  specious,  but  unfounded.  It  looks 
plausible  because  of  this  difference,  that  moral  judg- 
ments have  emotions  to  wait  upon  them,  speculative 
judgments  have  not.  Speculative  judgments  pass 
like  the  philosophers  that  write  them  down,  unheeded 
in  the  quiet  of  their  studies.     But  moral  judgments 

*  On  the  derivation  of  this  word,  whether  from  cvyflSriait  or 
vvvTi]j)r\(ns,   see   Athenaum,    1S77,   \'ol,    i.,    pp.    738,    798;    vol.    iii. 
pp.  16,  48. 


J38        OF   THE  NATURAL   LAW   OF  CONSCIENCE. 


are  rulers  of  the  commonwealth  :  they  are  risen  to 
as  they  go  by,  with  majesty  preceding  and  cares 
coming  after.  Their  presence  awakens  in  us  certain 
emotions,  conflicts  of  passion,  as  we  think  of  the 
good  that  we  should  do,  but  have  not  done,  or  of  the 
evil  that  goes  unremedied  and  unatoned  for.  Com- 
monly a  man  cannot  contemplate  his  duty,  a  difficult 
or  an  unfulfilled  duty  especially,  without  a  certain 
emotion,  very  otherwise  than  as  he  views  the  axioms 
of  mathematics.  There  is  a  great  difference  emo- 
tionally, but  intellectually  the  two  sets  of  principles, 
speculative  and  moral,  are  held  alike  as  necessary 
truths,  truths  that  not  only  are,  but  must  be,  and 
cannot  be  otherwise :  truths  in  which  the  predicate 
of  the  proposition  that  states  them  is  contained 
under  the  subject.  Such  are  called  self-evident  pro- 
positions ;  and  the  truths  that  they  express,  necessary 
truths.  The  enquiry  into  the  origin  of  our  primary 
moral  judgments  is  thus  merged  in  the  question,  how 
we  attain  to  necessary  truth. 

6.  The  question  belongs  to  Psychology,  not  to 
Ethics:  but  we  will  treat  it  briefly  for  ethical  pur- 
poses. And  first  for  a  clear  notion  of  the  kind  of 
judgments  that  we  are  investigating. 

"  The  primary  precepts  of  the  law  of  nature 
stand  to  the  practical  reason  as  the  first  principles 
of  scientific  demonstration  do  to  the  speculative 
reason :  for  both  sets  of  principles  are  self-evident. 
A  thing  is  said  to  be  self-evident  in  two  ways,  either 
in  itself,  or  in  reference  to  us.  In  itself  every  proposi- 
tion, the  predicate  of  which  can  be  got  from  consi- 
deration of  the  subject  is  said  to  be  self-evident.  But 


ORIGIN  OF  PRIMARY  MORAL   JUDGMENTS.        139 

it  happens  that  to  one  who  is  ignorant  of  the  defini- 
tion of  the  subject,  such  a  proposition  will  not  be 
self-evident :  as  this  proposition,  Man  is  a  rational 
being,  is  self-evident  in  its  own  nature,  because  to 
name  man  is  to  name  something  rational ;  and  yet, 
to  one  ignorant  what  man  is,  this  proposition  is  not 
self-evident.  And  hence  it  is  that,  as  Boethius 
says :  *  there  are  some  axioms  self-evident  to  all 
alike.'  Of  this  nature  are  all  those  propositions 
whose  terms  are  known  to  all,  as,  Every  whole  is 
greater  than  its  part;  and.  Things  which  are  equal  to 
the  same  thing  are  equal  to  one  another.  Some  proposi- 
tions again  are  self-evident  only  to  the  wise,  who 
understand  the  meaning  of  the  terms  :  as,  to  one 
who  understands  that  an  angel  is  not  a  body,  it  is 
self-evident  that  an  angel  is  not  in  a  place  by  way  of 
circumscription  ;*  which  is  not  manifest  to  others, 
who  do  not  understand  the  term."  (St.  Thos.,  la  2aj 
q.  94,  art.  2,  in  corp.) 

One  more  extract.  "  From  the  very  nature  of 
an  intellectual  soul  it  is  proper  to  man  that,  as  soon 
as  he  knows  what  a  whole  is,  and  what  a  part  is,  he 
knows  that  every  whole  is  greater  than  its  part ;  and 
so  of  the  rest.  But  what  is  a  whole,  and  what  a 
part,  that  he  cannot  know  except  through  sensory 
impressions.  And  therefore  Aristotle  shows  that 
the  knowledge  of  principles  comes  to  us  through  the 
senses."  (St.  Thos.,  la  2?e,  q.  51,  art.  i,  in  corp.) 

7.  Thus  the  propositions  that  right  is  to  be  done, 
benefactors  to  be  requited,  are  self-evident,  necessary 

•  Ciycumscri[tivt,   which    word   is   explaincfl    by   St   Thos .    la 
q.  52.  art.  1. 


1^0        OF   THE  NATURAL    LAW  OF  CONSCIENCE. 


truths,  to  any  child  who  has  learned  by  experience 
the  meaning  of  ri<;]it,  of  kindness,  and  of  a  return  oj 
kindness.      '  Yes,    but ' — some    one    will    say — '  how 
ever  does  he  get  to  know  what  ri[^ht  and  wrong  are  ? 
Surely  sensory  experience  cannot   teach  him  that.' 
We  answer,  man's  thoughts  begin  in  sense,  and  are 
perfected   by  reflection.     Let    us   take  the    idea  of 
wrong,  the  key  to  all  other  elementary  moral  ideas. 
The  steps  by  which  a  child  comes  to  the  fulness  of 
the  idea  of  wrong  may  be  these.     First,  the  thing  is 
forbidden  :  then  one  gets  punished  for  it.    Punishment 
and  prohibition  enter  in  by  eye  and  ear  and  other 
senses  besides.     Then  the  thing  is  offensive  to  those 
we  love  and  revere.     Then  it  is  bad  for  us.     Then  it 
is  shameful,  habby,  unfair,  unkind,  selfish,  hateful  to  God. 
All  these  points  of  the  idea  of  wrong  are  grasped  by 
the  intellect,  beginning  with  sensory  presentations  of 
what  is  seen  and  felt  and  heard  said.     Again  with 
the  idea  of  ought.     This  idea  is  sometimes  said  to 
defy  analysis.     But  we  have  gone  about  (c.  vi.)  to 
analyse  it  into  two  elements,  nature  requiring,  nature's 
King  commanding.     The  idea  of  wrong  we  analysed 
into  a  breach  of  this  natural  requirement,  and  this 
Divine  command  or  law.     Primary  moral  ideas,  then, 
yield  to  intellectual  analysis.     They  are  of  this  style  : 
to  be  done,  as  I  wish  to  be  rational  and  please  God  :  not 
to  be  done,  unless  I  wish  to   spoil   myself  and  disobey 
my   Maker.     But    primary   moral    ideas,    compared 
together,  make  primary  moral  judgments.     Primary 
moral  judgments,  therefore,   aris:  in  the   intellect, 
by  the    same   process  as  other    beliefs   arise  there 
ill  matters  of  necessary  truth. 


ORIGIN   OP  PRIMARY   MORAL   JUDGMENTS.        14I 

8.  Thus,  applying  the  principle  known  as  Occham's 
razor,  that  "  entities  arc  not  to  be  multiplied  without 
reason,"  we  refuse  to  acknowledge  any  Moral  Sense, 
distinct  from  Intellect.  We  know  of  no  peculiar 
faculty,  specially  made  to  receive  "  ideas,  pleasures 
and  pains  in  the  moral  order."  (Mackintosh,  Ethics, 
p.  206.)  Most  of  all,  we  emphatically  protest  against 
any  blind  power  being  accredited  as  the  organ  of 
morality.  We  cannot  accept  for  our  theory  of 
morals,  that  everything  is  right  which  warms  the 
breast  with  a  glow  of  enthusiasm,  and  all  those 
actions  wrong,  at  which  emotional  people  are  prone 
to  cry  out,  dreadful,  shocking.  We  cannot  accept 
emotions  for  arbitrators,  where  it  most  concerns 
reasonable  beings  to  have  what  the  Apostle  calls 
"enlightened  eyes  of  the  heart  "  (Ephes.  i.  18),  that 
we  may  "  know  to  refuse  the  evil  and  to  choose 
the  good."  (Isaias  vii.  15.)  A  judge  may  have  his 
emotions,  but  his  charge  to  the  jury  must  be  dictated, 
not  by  his  heart,  but  by  his  knowledge  of  the  law. 
And  the  voice  of  conscience,  whatever  feelings  it  may 
stir,  must  be  an  intellectual  utterance,  and,  to  be 
worth  anything  in  a  case  of  difficulty,  a  reasoned 
conclusion,  based  on  observation  of  facts,  and  appli- 
cation of  principles,  and  consultation  with  moral 
theologians  and  casuists.  A  subjective  and  emo- 
tional standard  of  right  and  wrong  is  as  treacherous 
and  untrustworthy  as  the  emotional  justification  of 
those  good  people,  who  come  of  a  sudden  to  "  feel 
converted." 

g.  It  would  be  unnecessary,  except  for  the  WTong- 
headedness  of  philosophers,   to    observe  that  con- 


142        OF  IHE  NATURAL   LAW   OF  CONSCIENCE. 


science  requires  educating.  As  moral  virtue  is  a 
habit  of  appetite,  rational  or  irrational,  a  formation 
resulting  from  frequent  acts ;  and  as  the  child  needs 
to  be  aided  and  assisted  from  without  towards  the 
performance  of  such  acts,  in  order  to  overcome  the 
frequent  resistance  of  appetite  to  reason  (c.  v.,  s.  ii., 
n.  4,  p,  71) :  so  the  springs  of  conscience  are  certain 
intellectual  habits,  whereby  the  subject  is  cognisant 
of  the  principles  of  natural  law,  and  of  their  bearing 
on  his  own  conduct,  habits  which,  like  the  habits 
of  moral  virtue,  require  to  be  formed  by  acts  from 
within  and  succour  from  without,  since  merely  the 
rudiments  of  the  habit  are  supplied  by  nature.  Even 
the  first  principles  of  morality  want  formulating  and 
pointing  out  to  children,  like  the  axioms  of  geometry. 
The  mother  tells  her  little  one:  *  Ernest,  or  Frank, 
be  a  good  boy  : '  while  the  schoolmaster  explains  to 
Master  Ernest  that  two  straight  lines  cannot  possibly 
enclose  a  space.  There  is  something  in  the  boy's 
mind  that  goes  along  with  and  bears  out  both  the 
teaching  of  his  master  and  his  mother's  exhortation  : 
something  that  says  within  him  :  *  To  be  sure,  those 
lines  can't  enclose  a  space : '  '  Certainly,  I  ought 
to  be  good.'  It  is  not  merely  on  authority  that  he 
accepts  these  propositions.  His  own  understanding 
welcomes  and  approves  them :  so  much  so,  that 
once  he  has  understood  them,  he  would  not  believe 
the  contrary  for  being  told  it.  You  would  not  per- 
suade a  child  that  it  was  right  to  pull  mother's 
hair  ;  or  that  half  an  orange  was  literally,  as  Hesiod 
says,  "  more  than  the  whole."  He  would  answer 
that  it  could  not  be,  that  he  knew  better. 


ORIGIN    OF  PRIMARY  MORAL   JUDGMENTS.        143 

10.  On  one  ground  there  is  greater  need  of  educa- 
tion for  the  conscience  than  for  any  other  intellectual 
formation  :  that  is  because  of  the  power  of  evil  to 
fascinate  and  blind  on  practical  issues  of  duty. 
Cicero  well  puts  it : 

"  We  are  amazed  and  perplexed  by  variety  of 
opinions  and  strife  of  authorities  ;  and  because  there 
is  not  the  same  divergence  upon  matters  of  sense, 
we  fancy  that  the  senses  afford  natural  certainty, 
while,  fo:  moral  matters,  because  some  men  take 
one  view,  some  another,  and  the  same  men  different 
views  at  different  times,  we  consider  that  any  settle- 
ment that  can  be  arrived  at  is  merely  conventional, 
which  is  a  huge  mistake.  The  fact  is,  there  is  no 
parent,  nor  nurse,  nor  schoolmaster,  nor  poet,  nor 
stage  play,  to  corrupt  the  judgments  of  sense,  nor 
consent  of  the  multitude  to  wrench  them  away  from 
the  truth.  It  is  for  minds  and  consciences  that 
all  the  snares  are  set,  as  well  by  the  agency  of 
those  whom  I  have  just  mentioned,  who  take  us  in 
our  tender  and  inexperienced  age,  and  ingrain  and 
fashion  us  as  they  will,  as  also  by  that  counterfeit 
presentment  of  good,  which  lurks  in  the  folds  of 
every  sense,  the  mother  of  all  evil,  pleasure,  under 
whose  seductive  blandishments  men  fail  to  recog- 
nise the  moral  good  that  nature  offers,  because  it  is 
unaccompanied  by  this  itching  desire  and  satisfac- 
tion." (Cicero,  De  Legibtis,  i.,  17.) 

Readings. — St.Thos.,  la,  q.  79,  art.  11 — 13  ;  Plato, 
Protagoras,  325,  326;  John  Grote,  Examination  0} 
Uiili.tarian  Philosophy,  pp.  i6g,  207,  208  ;  Cardinal 
Newman,  Granunar  0/  Assejit,  pp.  102 — 112. 


144        OF   THE   NATURAL    LAW   OF  CONSCIENCE. 


Section  II. — Of  tlu  invariability  of  Primary  Moral 

Judgments. 

I.  The  following  narrative  is  taken  from  Grote's 
History  of  Greece,  c.  8i. : 

"  It  was  a  proud  day  for  the  Carthaginian 
general*  when  he  stood  as  master  on  the  ground  of 
Himera ;  enabled  to  fulfil  the  duty,  and  satisfy  the 
exigencies,  of  revenge  for  his  slain  grandfather. 
Tragical  indeed  was  the  consummation  of  this 
long-cherished  purpose.  ...  All  the  male  captives, 
3,000  in  number,  v.'ere  conveyed  to  the  precise  spot 
where  Hamilkar  had  been  slain,  and  there  put  to 
death  with  indignity,  as  an  expiatory  satisfaction 
to  his  lost  honour.  No  man  can  read  the  account 
of  this  wholesale  massacre  without  horror  and 
repugnance.  Yet  we  cannot  doubt,  that  among  all 
the  acts  of  Hannibal's  life,  this  was  the  one  in  which 
he  most  gloried ;  that  it  realized  in  the  most  com- 
plete and  emphatic  manner,  his  concurrent  aspirations 
of  filial  sentiment,  religions  obligation,  and  honour  as 
a  patriot  ;f  that  to  show  mercy  would  have  been 
regarded  as  a  mean  dereliction  of  these  esteemed 
impulses.  .  .  .  Doubtless,  the  feelings  of  Hannibal 
were  cordially  shared,  and  the  plenitude  of  his 
revenge  envied,  by  the  army  around  him.  So 
different,  sometimes  so  totally  contrary,  is  the  tone 
and  direction  of  the  moral  sentiments,  among  dif- 
ferent ages  and  nations." 

*  Hannibal,  B.C.  409,  therefore  not  the  victor  of  Cannae. 
t  ItaHcs  mine. 


INVARIABILITY  OF  PRIMARY  MORAL  JUDGMENTS.  145 

We  may  supplement  this  story  by  another  from 
Herodotus  (iii.,  38)  : 

"  Darius,  after  he  had  got  the  kingdom,  called 
into  his  presence  certain  Greeks  who  were  at  hand, 
and  asked,  *  What  he  should  pay  them  to  eat  the 
bodies  of  their  fathers  when  they  died.'  To  which 
they  answered,  that  there  was  no  sum  that  would 
tempt  them  to  do  such  a  thing.  He  then  sent  for 
certain  Indians,  of  the  race  called  Callatians,  men 
who  eat  their  fathers,  and  asked  them,  while  the 
Greeks  were  standing  by,  and  knew  by  the  aid  of  an 
interpreter  all  that  was  said — '  What  he  should  give 
them  to  burn  the  bodies  of  their  fathers,  at  their 
decease  ?  '  The  Indians  exclaimed  aloud,  and  bade 
him  forbear  such  language.  Such  is  the  way  of 
men ;  and  Pindar  was  right  in  my  judgment,  when 
he  said,  *  Convention  is  king  over  all.'  " 

2.  If  any  one  held  that  the  natural  law  of  con- 
science was  natural  in  the  same  way  as  the  sense 
of  temperature :  if  one  held  to  the  existence  of  a 
Moral  Sense  in  all  men,  settling  questions  of  right 
and  wrong,  as  surely  as  all  men-  know  sweet  things 
from  bitter  by  tasting  them  :  these  stories,  and 
they  could  be  multiplied  by  hundreds,  abundantly 
suffice  to  confute  the  error.  There  is  no  authentic 
copy  of  the  moral  law,  printed,  framed,  and  hung 
up  by  the  hand  of  Nature,  in  the  inner  sanctuary  of 
every  human  heart.  Man  has  to  learn  his  duties 
as  he  learns  the  principles  of  health,  the  laws  of 
mechanics,  the  construction  and  navigation  of  vessels, 
the  theorems  of  geometry,  or  any  other  art  or  science. 
And  he  is  just  as  likely  to  go  wrong,  and  has  gone 


146        OF  THE  NATURAL   LAW  OF  CONSCIENCE. 

wrong  as  grievously,  in  his  judgments  on  moral 
matters  as  on  any  other  subject  of  human  know- 
ledge. The  knowledge  of  duties  is  natural  (as 
explained  in  the  previous  section,  n.  2),  not  because 
it  comes  spontaneously,  but  because  it  is  necessary 
to  our  nature  for  the  development  and  perfection  of 
the  same.  Thus  a  man  ought,  so  far  as  he  can,  to 
learn  his  duties  :  but  we  cannot  say  of  a  man,  as 
such,  that  he  oiight  to  learn  geometry  or  navigation. 
If  a  man  does  not  know  his  duties,  he  is  excused 
by  ignorance,  according  to  the  rules  under  which 
ignorance  excuses,  (c.  iii.,  s,  i.,  nn.  3 — 5,  p.  27.)  If 
a  man  does  not  know  navigation,  there  is  no  ques- 
tion oi  exciise  for  what  he  was  not  bound  to  learn, 
but  he  may  suffer  loss  by  his  want  of  knowledge. 

3.  It  was  furthermore  observed  above  (I.e.),  that 
the  natural  law  was  so  called  as  being  found  expressed 
more  or  less  perfectly  in  the  minds  of  all  men,  and 
therefore  being  a  proper  element  of  human  nature. 
It  remains  to  see  how  much  this  universal  natural 
expression  amounts  to.  That  is  at  once  apparent 
from  our  previous  explanation  of  synderesis.  (s.i.,  nn.  5, 
seq.,  p.  139.)  Not  a  complete  and  accurate  know- 
ledge of  the  natural  law  is  found  in  all  minds,  far 
from  it  ;  but  synderesis  is  found  in  all.  This  is 
apparent  from  Mr.  Grote's  own  phrases,  "  aspira- 
tions of  filial  sentiment,"  "  religious  obligation," 
*'  honour  as  a  patriot,"  Parents  are  to  be  honoured, 
we  must  do  our  duty  to  God  and  to  our  country  :  there 
Hannibal  was  at  one  with  the  most  approved 
teachers  of  morality.  Callatian  and  Greek  agreed 
in  the  recognition  of  the  commandment,  Honour  thy 


IMMUTABILITY   OF   THE   NATURAL   LAW.         14-. 


father  and  thy  mother.  That  was  the  major  premiss  of 
them  both,  in  the  moral  syllogism  (s.  i.,  n.  3,  p.  135), 
which  ruled  their  respective  consciences.  Their 
difference  was  upon  the  applying  minor,  as  it  is 
called ;  the  Greek  regarding  the  dissolution  of  the 
body  into  its  elements  by  fire,  and  so  saving  it  from 
corruption,  as  the  best  means  of  honouring  the  dead : 
the  Callatians  preferring  to  raise  their  parents  as  it 
were  to  life  again,  by  making  them  the  food  of  their 
living  children.  Hannibal,  again,  had  before  his 
mind  the  grand  principle  of  retribution,  that  wrong- 
doing must  be  expiated  by  suffering.  But  he 
had  not  heard  the  words  "  Vengeance  is  Mine  ;  " 
and  mistakenly  supposed  it  to  rest  with  himself  to 
appoint  and  carry  out  his  own  measure  of  revenge. 
Wiicther  he  was  quite  so  invincibly  ignorant  on  this 
point,  as  Grote  represents,  is  open  to  doubt.  At 
any  rate  he  was  correct  in  the  primary  moral 
judgment  on  which  he  proceeded. 

Reading. — St.  Thos.,  la  2ae,  q.  94,  art.  6. 

Section  III. — Of  the  ivimutaUlity  of  the  Natural  Law, 

I.  Besides  printing,  many  methods  are  now  in 
vogue  for  multiplying  copies  of  a  document.  Com- 
monly the  document  is  written  out  with  special  ink 
on  special  paper:  the  copy  thus  used  is  called  a 
stencil ;  and  from  it  other  copies  are  struck  off.  We 
will  suppose  the  stencil  to  be  that  page  of  the  Eternal 
Law  written  in  the  Mind  of  God,  which  regulates 
human  acts,  technically  so  called.  The  copies  struck 
off  from  that  stencil  will  be  the  Natural  Law  in  the 
mind  of  this  man  and  of  that.     Now,  as  all  who  are 


148        OF  THE  NATURAL    LAW  OF  CONSCIENCE. 

familiar  with  copying  processes  know  too  well,  it 
happens  at  times  that  a  copy  comes  out  very  faint, 
and  in  parts  not  at  all.  These  faint  and  partial 
copies  represent  the  Natural  Law  as  it  is  imperfectly 
developed  in  the  minds  of  many  men.  In  this  sense, 
and  as  we  may  say  siihjectively,  the  Natural  Law  is 
mutable,  very  mutable  indeed.  Still,  as  no  one  would 
say  that  the  document  had  been  altered,  because 
some  copies  of  it  were  bad,  so  it  is  not  strictly 
correct  to  say  that  the  Natural  Law  varies  with  these 
subjective  varieties.  Appeal  would  be  made  to  a  full 
and  perfectly  printed  impression  of  the  document, 
one  that  rendered  the  stencil  exactly.  The  Natural 
Law  must  be  viewed  in  like  manner,  as  it  would 
exist  in  a  mind  perfectly  enlightened  concerning 
the  whole  duty  of  man,  and  exactly  reproducing 
in  itself  that  portion  of  the  Eternal  Law  which 
ordains  such  duty.  Were  such  a  mind  to  discern 
a  natural  obligation  to  lie  differently  at  two  different 
times,  all  the  relevant  circumstances  being  alike  in 
both  cases,  and  the  moral  solution  different,  then 
only  could  the  Natural  Law  be  held  to  have  changed. 
2.  But  this  is  clearly  impossible.  The  conclusion 
of  a  geometrical  theorem  is  a  truth  for  all  time. 
There  is  no  difference  here  between  a  complicated 
theorem,  having  many  conditions,  and  a  simpler 
theorem  with  fewer.  It  is  indeed  easier  for  a  few 
than  for  many  conditions  to  be  all  present  together: 
but  the  enunciation  of  the  conclusion  supposes  all 
the  conditions,  whatever  their  number.  The  same 
in  a  practical  manner,  as  in  the  stability  of  a  bridge. 
The   bridge  that   would    stand    in    England,   would 


IMMUTABILITY   OF  THE   NATURAL    LAW.         14Q 

Stand  in  Ceylon.  If  it  would  not,  there  must  have 
occurred  some  change  in  the  conditions,  as  the  heat 
of  the  tropical  sun  upon  the  girders.  A  point  of 
casuistry  also,  however  knotty,  once  determined,  is 
determined  for  ever  and  aye,  for  the  circumstances 
under  which  it  was  determined.  The  Natural  Law 
in  this  sense  is  absolutely  immutable,  no  less  in 
each  particular  application  than  in  the  most  general 
principles.  We  must  uniformly  pass  the  same 
judgment  on  the  same  case.  What  is  once  right 
and  reasonable,  is  always  right  and  reasonable,  in 
the  same  matter.  Where  to-day  there  is  only  one 
right  course,  there  cannot  to-morrow  be  two,  unless 
circumstances  have  altered.  The  Natural  Law  is 
thus  far  immutable,  every  jot  and  tittle. 

3.  No  power  in  heaven  above  nor  on  earth 
beneath  can  dispense  from  any  portion  of  the 
Natural  Law.  For  the  matter  of  the  negative 
precepts  of  that  law  is,  as  we  have  seen,  some- 
thing bad  in  itself  and  repugnant  to  human  nature, 
and  accordingly  forbidden  by  God:  while  the  matter 
of  the  positive  precepts  is  something  good  and 
necessary  to  man,  commanded  by  God.  If  God 
were  to  take  off  His  command,  or  prohibition,  the 
intrinsic  exigency,  or  intolerableness,  of  the  thing 
to  man  would  still  remain,  being  as  inseparable 
from  humanity  as  certain  mathematical  properties 
from  a  triangle.  Pride  is  not  made  for  man,  nor 
fornication,     nor    lying,     nor    polygamy:*    human 

•  There  is  a  theological  difficulty  about  the  polygamy  of  the 
patriarchs,  which  will  be  touched  on  in  Natural  Law,  c.  v\.,  9.  ii , 
ti   4,  p  27a. 


I50         OF   THE   NATURAL   LAW   OF  CONSCIENCE. 


nature  would  cry  out  against  them,  even  were  the 
Almighty  in  a  particular  instance  to  withdraw  His 
prohibition.  What  would  be  the  use,  then,  of  any 
such  withdrawal  ?  It  would  not  make  the  evil  thing 
good.  An  evil  thing  it  would  still  remain,  unnatural, 
irrational,  and  as  such,  displeasing  to  God,  the 
Supreme  Reason.  The  man  would  not  be  free  to 
do  the  thing,  even  though  God  did  not  forbid  it.  It 
appears,  therefore,  that  the  Divine  prohibition,  and 
similarly  the  Divine  command,  which  we  have  proved 
(c.  vi.,  s.  ii.,  nn.  lo,  ii,  p.  121)  to  be  necessarily  im- 
posed in  matters  of  natural  evil  and  of  naturally 
imperative  good,  is  imposed  as  a  hard  and  fast  line, 
so  long  as  the  intrinsic  good  or  evil  remains  the  same. 
4.  There  is,  therefore,  no  room  for  Evolution  in 
Ethics  and  Natural  Law  any  more  than  in  Geometry. 
One  variety  of  geometrical  construction,  or  of  moral 
action,  may  succeed  another ;  but  the  truths  of  the 
science,  by  which  those  varieties  are  judged,  change 
not.  There  is  indeed  this  peculiarity  about  moralit}/, 
distinguishing  it  from  art,  that  if  a  man  errs  in- 
vincibly, the  evil  that  he  takes  for  good  is  not 
formally  evil,  or  evil  as  he  wills  it,  and  the  good  that 
he  takes  for  evil  is  formally  evil  to  him.  (c.  iii.,  s.  ii., 
n.  7,  p.  33.)  So  there  is  variation  and  possible  Evolu- 
tion in  bare  formal  good  and  bare  formal  evil,  as 
ignorance  gradually  changes  into  knowledge ;  and 
likewise  Reversion,  as  knowledge  declines  into 
ignorance.  Even  this  Evolution  and  Reversion  have 
their  limits:  they  cannot  occur  in  the  primary  princi- 
ples of  morality,  as  we  saw  in  the  last  section.  But 
morality  materiel  and  objective, — complete  morality, 


IMMUTABlUiy   01'    THE   NATURAL    LAW.  151 


where  the  formal  and  material  elements  agree,  where 
real  wrong  is  seen  to  be  wrong,  and  real  right  is 
known  for  right — in  this  morality  there  is  no  Evolu- 
tion. If  Hannibal  offered  human  sacrifices  to  his 
grandfather  because  he  knew  no  better,  and  could 
not  have  known  better,  than  to  think  himself 
bound  so  to  do,  he  is  to  be  excused,  and  even 
praised  for  his  piety :  still  it  was  a  mistaken  piety ; 
and  the  act,  apart  from  the  light  in  which  the  doer 
viewed  it,  was  a  hideous  crime.  An  incorrupt  teacher 
of  morals  would  have  taught  the  Carthaginian,  not 
that  he  was  doing  something  perfectly  right  for  his 
age  and  country,  which,  however,  would  be  wrong 
in  Germany  some  centuries  later,  but  that  he  was 
doing  an  act  there  and  then  evil  and  forbidden  of 
God,  from  which  he  was  bound,  upon  admonition, 
instantly  to  desist.* 

5.  There  are  Evolution  and  Reversion  in  archi- 
tecture, but  not  in  the  laws  of  stability  of  structure, 
nor  in  the  principles  of  beauty  as  realized  in  build- 
ing. A  combination,  ugly  now,  was  not  beautiful  in 
the  days  of  Darius.  Tastes  differ,  but  not  right 
tastes ;  and  moral  notions,  but  not  right  moral 
notions.  It  is  true  that  questions  of  right  and 
wrong  occur  in  one  state  of  society,  that  had  no 
relevance  in  an  earlier  state,  the  conditions  of  the 
case  not  having  arisen.  But  so  it  is  in  archi- 
tecture ;  there  are  no  arches  in  the  Parthenon. 
The  principle  of  the  arch,  however,  held  in  the 
age  of  Pericles,  though  not  applied. 

•  The  author  has  seen  reason  somewhat  to  modify  this  view,  aa 
appears  by  the  Appendix.  (Note  to  Third  Edition.) 


152        OF   THE  NATURAL   LAW  OF  CONSCIENCE. 


6.  The  progress  of  Moral  Science  is  the  more 
and  more  perfect  development  of  the  Natural  Law 
in  the  heart  of  man,  a  psychological,  not  an  onto- 
logical  development.  And  Moral  Science  does 
progress.  No  man  can  be  a  diligent  student  of 
morality  for  years,  without  coming  to  the  under- 
standing of  many  things,  for  which  one  would  look 
in  vain  in  Aristotle's  Ethics  and  Politics,  or  in  Cicero, 
De  Officiis,  or  even  in  the  Summa  of  St.  Thomas, 
or  perhaps  in  any  book  ever  written.  New  moral 
questions  come  for  discussion  as  civilization  ad- 
vances. The  commercial  system  of  modern  times 
would  furnish  a  theme  for  another  De  Lugo.  And 
still  on  this  path  of  ethical  discovery,  to  quote  the 
text  that  Bacon  loved,  "  Many  shall  pass  over,  and 
knowledge  shall  be  multiplied."  (Daniel  xii.  4.) 

Readings. — St.  Thos.,  Supplement,  q.  65,  art.  i,  in 
Corp. ;  ib,,  q.  65,  art.  2,  in  corp.,  and  ad  i ;  Hughes, 
Super jiatural  Morals,  pp.  67,  68,  reviewed  in  The 
Month  for  August,  1891,  pp.  542.  543. 


Section  IV. — Of  Probabilism. 

I.  Sometimes  conscience  returns  a  clear,  positive 
answer  as  to  the  morality  of  an  act  contemplated. 
True  or  false  the  answer  may  be,  but  the  ring  of  it 
has  no  uncertain  sound.  At  other  times  conscience 
is  perplexed,  and  her  answer  is,  perhaps,  and  perhaps 
not.  When  the  woman  hid  Achimaas  and  Jonathan 
in  the  well,  and  said  to  Absalom's  servants,  "  They 
passed  on  in  haste"  (2  Kings  xvii.  17 — 21),  did  she 
do  right  in  speaking  thus  to  save  their  lives  ?     A 


OF  PROBABJUSM.  15J 

point  that  has  perplexed  consciences  for  centuries. 
A.  man's  hesitation  is  sometimes  subjective  and 
peculiar  to  himself.  It  turns  on  a  matter  of  fact, 
which  others  know  full  well,  though  he  doubts;  or 
on  a  point  of  law,  dark  to  him,  but  clearly  ruled  by 
the  consent  of  the  learned.  In  such  cases  it  is  his 
duty  to  seek  information  from  people  about  him, 
taking  so  much  trouble  to  procure  it  as  the  import- 
ance of  the  matter  warrants,  not  consulting  ten 
doctors  as  to  the  ownership  of  one  hen.  But  it 
may  be  that  all  due  enquiries  fail.  The  fact  remains 
obscure  ;  or  about  the  law,  doctors  differ,  and  argu- 
ments conflict  indecisively.  What  is  the  man  to  do  ? 
Take  the  safe  course  :  suppose  there  is  an  obligation, 
and  act  accordingly  ?  This  principle,  put  as  a  com- 
mand, would  make  human  life  intolerable.  It  is, 
moreover,  false,  when  so  put,  as  we  shall  presently 
prove.  Take  the  easy  course,  and  leave  the  obliga- 
tion out  of  count  ?  This  principle  is  more  nearly 
correct  than  the  other :  but  it  needs  interpretation, 
else  it  may  prove  dangerously  lax. 

2.  To  return  to  Achimaas  and  Jonathan  and 
their  hostess.  Some  such  reckoning  as  this  may 
have  passed  through  her  mind :  '  Lying  lips  are 
an  abomination  to  the  Lord  :  but  is  it  a  lie  to  put 
murderers  off  the  scent  of  blood  ? '  To  that  ques- 
tion finding  no  answer,  she  may  have  made  up  her 
mind  in  this  way:  'Well,  I  don't  know,  but  I'll 
risk  it.*  If  that  were  her  procedure,  she  did  not 
walk  by  the  scientific  lines  of  Probabilism.  The 
probabilist  runs  no  risk,  enters  upon  no  uncertainty, 
and  yet  he  by    no    means  always  follows  what   is 


154        OF  THE   NATURAL   LAW  OF  CONSCIENCE. 


technically  termed  the  safe  course,  that  is,  the 
course  which  supposes  the  obligation,  e.g.,  in  the 
case  in  point,  to  have  said  simply  where  the  men 
were.  How  then  does  the  probabilist  contrive  to 
extract  certainty  out  of  a  case  of  insoluble  doubt? 
By  aid  of  what  is  called  a  rejiex  principle.  A  reflex 
is  opposed  to  a  di7'ect  principle.  A  direct  principle 
lays  down  an  obligation,  as  it  would  bind  one  who 
had  a  perfect  discernment  of  the  law  and  of  the 
facts  of  the  case,  and  of  the  application  of  the  one 
to  the  other,  and  who  was  perfectly  able  to  keep  the 
law.  By  a  reflex  principle,  a  man  judges  of  his  own 
act,  taking  account  of  the  imperfection  of  his  know- 
ledge and  the  limitations  of  his  power.  Probabihsm 
steps  in,  only  where  a  case  is  practically  insoluble  to 
an  agent  upon  direct  principles.  The  probabilist 
thereupon  leaves  the  direct  speculative  doubt  un- 
solved. He  relinquishes  the  attempt  of  determining 
what  a  man  should  do  in  the  case  in  question,  who 
had  a  thorough  insight  into  the  lie  of  the  law.  He 
leaves  that  aside,  and  considers  what  is  his  duty, 
or  not  his  duty,  in  the  deficiency  of  his  knowledge. 
Then  he  strikes  upon  the  principle,  which  is  the  root 
of  Probabilism,  that  a  doubtful  law  has  no  binding 
power.  It  will  be  observed  that  this  is  a  reflex 
principle.  For  objectively  nothing  is  doubtful,  but 
everything  is  or  is  not  in  point  of  fact.  To  a  mind 
that  had  a  full  grasp  of  the  objective  order  of  things, 
there  would  be  no  doubtful  law:  such  a  mind  woulci 
discern  the  law  in  every  case  as  holding  or  not  hold- 
ing. But  no  human  mind  is  so  perfect.  Every  man 
has  to  take  account  of  his  own  limitations  of  vision 


OF  PROBABILISM  155 


in  jud^'inpf  of  his  duty.  The  question  for  me  is,  not 
the  law  absohitcly,  but  the  law  as  far  as  I  can  nmke 
it  out.  Our  proposition,  then,  states  that  when  an 
individual,  usin^  such  moral  diligence  of  enquiry  aa 
the  gravity  of  the  matter  calls  for,  still  remains  in  a 
state  of  honest  doubt  as  to  whether  the  law  binds, 
in  that  mental  condition  it  does  not  bind  him. 

3.  What  the  law  docs  not  forbid,  it  leaves  open. 
Aristotle  indeed  (Eth.,  V.,  xi.,  i)  says  the  contrary, 
that  what  the  law  does  not  command  (he  instances 
suicide),  it  forbids.  All  that  he  seems  to  mean  is, 
that  if  there  be  an  act  which  at  times  might  appear 
advantageous,  and  yet  is  never  commanded,  there 
is  a  presumption  of  the  legislator  being  averse  to 
that  act.  Again,  there  are  special  occasions,  in  view 
of  which  the  legislator  undertakes  to  regulate  the 
whole  outward  conduct  of  a  man  by  positive 
enactment,  as  with  a  soldier  on  parade :  what  is 
not  there  commanded,  is  forbidden.  But  these 
instances  do  not  derogate  from  our  general  propo- 
sition, which  is  proved  in  this  way.  The  office  of 
law  is  not  to  loose,  but  to  bind.  It  declares,  not 
what  the  subject  may  do,  but  what  he  must  or  must 
not.  It  does  not  bring  liberty,  but  restriction. 
Therefore,  if  any  one  wishes  to  assert  a  restriction, 
he  must  go  to  a  law  to  prove  it.  If  he  can  find 
none,  liberty  remains.  The  law  is  laid  on  liberty. 
Liberty  is  not  the  outcome  of  law,  but  prior  to  it. 
Liberty  is  in  possession.  The  bi.:rden  of  proof  rests 
with  those  who  would  abridge  liberty  and  impose  an 
obligation.  It  is  an  axiom  of  law  itself,  a  natural, 
not  an  arbitrary  axiom,  that  better  is  the  conditiuti  oj 


156        OF  THE   NATURAL    LAW  OF  CONSCIENCE. 


the  possessor :  which  amounts  in  this  matter  to 
another  statement,  also  axiomatic,  that  a  law  binds 
not  till  it  is  pYomulgaled.  But  a  law  of  which  I  have 
serious  outstanding  doubts  whether  it  exists  at 
aU,  or,  if  existent,  whether  it  reaches  my  case, 
is  for  this  occasion  a  law  not  duly  promulgated 
to  me.  Therefore  it  binds  me  not,  and  my  liberty 
remains. 

4.  It  remains  to  consider  what  constitutes  a 
serious  outstanding'  doubt.  The  word  outstanding  has 
been  already  explained.  It  means  that  we  have 
sought  for  certain  information,  and  cannot  procure 
it.  Now  what  is  a  serious  doubt  ?  It  is  a  doubt 
founded  on  a  positive  opinion  against  the  existence 
of  the  law,  or  its  applicability  to  the  case  in  point, 
an  opinion  fraught  with  probability,  solid,  comparative, 
practical  probability.  The  doubt  must  not  be  mere 
negative  doubt,  or  ignorance  that  cannot  tell  why 
it  doubts;  not  a  vague  suspicion,  or  sentimental 
impression  that  defies  all  intellectual  analysis ;  not 
a  mere  subjective  inability  to  make  up  one's  mind, 
but  some  counter-reason  that  admits  of  positive 
statement,  as  we  say,  in  black  and  white.  It  is  true 
that  many  minds  cannot  define  their  grounds  of 
doubt,  even  when  these  are  real.  Such  minds  are 
unfit  to  apply  the  doctrine  of  Probabilism  to  them- 
selves, but  must  seek  its  application  from  others. 
The  opinion  against  the  law,  when  explicitly  drawn 
out,  must  be  found  to  possess  a  solid  probability. 
It  may  be  either  an  intrinsic  argument  from  reason 
and  the  nature  of  the  case,  or  an  extrinsic  argument 
from  the  word  of  some  authority :  but  the  reason  or 


OF  PkODABILIS.^T.  157 

the  authority  must  be  grave.  The  opinion  is  thus 
said  to  be  inirimically  or  extrinsically  probable.  The 
probabiHty  must  also  be  comparative.  There  is  many 
an  argument,  in  itself  a  very  good  one,  that  perishes 
when  we  come  to  consider  the  crushing  weight  of 
evidence  on  the  other  side.  An  opinion  is  compara- 
tively probable,  when  after  hearing  all  the  reasons 
and  all  the  authorities  on  the  other  side,  the  said 
opinion  still  remains  not  unlikely,  which  is  all  that 
we  mean  to  say  of  an  opinion  here,  when  we  call  it 
probable.  In  ordinary  English,  the  word  probable 
means  more  likely  than  otherwise,  which  is  not  the 
signification  of  the  Latin  opinio  probabilis.  Lastly, 
the  probability  must  be  practical :  it  must  take 
account  of  all  the  circumstances  of  the  case. 
Practical  probability  is  opposed  to  speculative,  which 
leaves  out  of  count  certain  circumstances,  which  are 
pretty  sure  to  be  present,  and  to  make  all  the 
difference  in  the  issue.  Thus  it  is  speculatively 
probable  that  a  Catholic  might  without  sin  remain 
years  without  confession,  never  having  any  grievous 
sins  to  confess,  grievous  sin  alone  being  necessary 
matter  for  that  sacrament.  There  is  no  downright 
cogent  reason  why  a  man  might  not  do  so.  And 
yet,  if  he  neglected  such  ordinary  means  of  grace  as 
confession  of  venial  sin,  having  it  within  reach, 
month  after  month,  no  one,  considering  "  the  sin 
which  surrounds  us,"  would  expect  that  man  to  go 
without  grievous  scathe.  In  mechanics,  there  are 
many  machines  that  work  prettily  enough  in  specu- 
lation and  on  paper,  where  the  inventors  do  not 
consider  the  difficulties  of  imperfect  material,  careless 


158        OF   THE  NATURAL   LAW  OF  CONSCIENCE. 

handling,  climate,  and  other  influences,  that  render 
the  invention  of  no  practical  avail. 

5.  The  safest  use  of  Probabilism  is  in  the  field 
of  property  transactions  and  of  positive  law.  There 
is  greatest  risk  of  using  it  amiss  in  remaining  in  a 
false  religion.  All  turns  upon  the  varying  amount 
of  trouble  involved  in  moral  diligence  of  enquiry, 
according  as  the  matter  at  issue  is  a  point  of  mere 
observance  or  of  vital  interest. 

6.  The  point  on  which  the  probability  turns 
must  be  the  lawfulness  or  unlawfulness  of  the  action, 
not  any  other  issue,  as  that  of  the  physical  conse- 
quences. Before  rolling  boulder-stones  down  a  hill 
to  amuse  myself,  it  is  not  enough  to  have  formed 
a  probable  opinion  that  there  is  no  one  coming  up. 
That  would  be  Probabilisn.  misapplied.  The  correct 
enquiry  is :  Does  any  intrinsic  reason  or  extrinsic 
authority  make  the  opinion  probable,  that  it  is 
lawful  for  mere  amusement  to  roll  down  rocks  with 
any  belief  short  of  certainty  that  no  one  will  be 
crushed  thereby?  The  probability,  thus  turned  on 
to  the  lawfulness  of  the  action,  breaks  down  alto- 
gether. This  explanation,  borne  in  mind,  will  save 
much  misapprehension. 


CHAPTER   IX. 

OF   THE    SANCTION    OF   THE    NATURAL    LAW. 

Section  I. — Of  a  Twofold  Sanction,  Natural  and  Divine. 

I.  The  sanction  of  a  law  is  the  punishment  for 
breaking  it.  The  punishment  for  final,  persistent 
breach  of  the  natural  law  is  failure  to  attain  the 
perfect  state  and  last  end  of  the  human  soul,  which 
is  happiness.  If  existence  be  prolonged  under  this 
failure,  it  must  be  in  the  contrary  state  of  misery, 
This  failure  and  misery  is  at  once  a  natural  restilt 
and  a  divine  infliction.  It  is  the  natural  result  of 
repeated  flagrant  acts  of  moral  evil,  whereby  a  man 
has  made  his  nature  hideous,  corrupted  and  over- 
thrown it.  (c.  vi.,  s.  i.,  nn.  4,  5,  p.  iii.)  For  an  end  is 
gained  by  taking  the  means,  and  lost  by  neglect  of  the 
means  thereto.  Now,  as  we  have  seen,  happiness  is 
an  intellectual  act,  the  perfection  of  an  intellectual  or 
rational  nature  (c.  ii.,  s.  ii.,  p.  6) ;  and  the  means  to  it 
are  living  rationally  :  for  a  reasonable  being,  to  do 
well  and  fare  well,  must  live  by  that  reason,  which  is 
the  form  of  his  being,  (c.  vi.,  s.  i.,  n.  4,  p.  iii.)  Who- 
ever therefore  goes  about  contradicting  the  reason 
that  is  within  him  (c.  v.,  s.  iii.,  n.  3,  p.  74)  is  not 
in    the    way    to    attain    to    happiness.      Happiness 


iCo     OF  THE   SANCTION   OF  THE   NATURAL    LAW. 


the  end  of  man,  the  creature  of  all  others  the  most 
complex,  is  not  to  be  stumbled  upon  by  chance. 
You  may  make  two  stones  lean  upright  one  against 
the  other  by  chance,  but  otherwise  than  by  a 
methodical  application  of  means  to  the  end  you 
could  not  support  the  spire  of  Salisbury  Cathedral. 

2.  Man's  is  a  progressive  nature  (c.  vi.,  s.  i.,  nn. 
2, 3,  p.  109),  himself  being  the  director  of  his  own  pro- 
gress. Other  progressive  natures  may  be  spoilt  by 
their  requirements  being  denied,  and  contrary  things 
done  to  them.  Man  has  his  requirements.  It 
depends  mainly  on  himself  whether  he  acts  up  to 
them  or  against  them.  If  he  acts  against  them,  he 
so  far  spoils  himself;  and  once  he  is  thoroughly 
spoilt  by  his  own  doing,  the  final  perfection  of 
humanity  is  gone  from  him  for  ever.  It  is  the 
natural  result. 

3.  I  have  spoken  (n.  i)  of  repeated  flagrant  acts: 
not  that  I  would  ignore  the  evil  set  of  the  will  that 
results  from  one  gross  and  deliberate  evil  deed  (see  c. 
ix.,  s.  ii.,  n.  6,  p.  168) :  but  because  the  case  is  clearer 
where  the  acts  have  been  multiplied.  However  we 
must  not  omit  to  observe,  that  it  is  not  any  vice,  or 
evil  habit,  that  formally  unfits  a  man  for  his  final 
happiness,  but  an  actual  evil  set  of  the  will,  coming 
of  actual  sin  unrepented  of,  which  set  is  more 
decided,  when  that  uncancelled  sin  is  the  last  ol 
many  such,  and  the  outcome  of  a  habit.  But 
supposing  an  habitual  sinner  to  have  repented,  and 
his  repentance  to  have  been  ratified  by  God,  and 
that  he  dies,  not  actually  in  sin,  but  before  the  habit 
of  sin  has  been  eradicated  (c.  v.,  s.  ii.,  n.  i,  p.  69), — we 


TWOFOLD   SANCTION.  NATURAL   AND   DIVINE.     i6i 

may  say  of  him,  that  his  "  foot  is  set  in  the  right 
way,"  that  is,  his  will  is  actually  right,  and  the 
obstacle  to  happiness  is  removed.  The  evil  habit  in 
him  is  not  an  actual  adhesion  of  his  will  to  evil,  but 
a  proneness  to  relapse  into  that  state.  It  is  only 
remotely  and  potentially  evil.  It  is  a  seed  of  evil, 
which  however  will  not  germinate  in  the  good  and 
blissful  surroundings  to  which  the  soul  has  been 
transplanted,  but  remain  for  ever  sterile,  or  rather, 
will  speedily  decay. 

4.  If  we  leave  God  out  of  morality,  and  take 
account  only  of  the  philosophical  aspect  of  sin  (c.  vi., 
s.  ii.,  n.  6,  p.  119),  we  have  nothing  further  to  say  of 
the  sanction  than  this,  which  has  been  said:  'Act 
against  nature,  and  you  will  end  bj^  ruining  your 
nature,  and  fail  of  your  final  perfection  and  happi- 
ness.' But  now  God  comes  in,  the  giver  of  the  law 
of  nature ;  and  the  failure,  already  a  natural  result, 
must  henceforth  be  viewed  also  as  a  Divine  chastise- 
ment. There  is  no  law  without  a  sanction.  There 
is  no  law,  the  giver  of  which  can  allow  it  to  be 
broken  with  impunity.  A  legislator  who  dispensed 
with  all  sanction,  would  rightly  be  taken  by  young 
and  old  not  to  be  in  earnest  in  his  command.  If 
then  God  must  give  a  law  to  man  whom  He  has 
created  (c.  vi.,  s.  ii.,  n.  9,  p.  120),  He  must  attach  a 
sanction  to  that  law ;  and  if  the  law  is  according  to 
the  exigency  of  human  nature  (c.vi.,  s.ii.n.ii,p.i22), 
so  will  the  sanction  also  be  the  natural  outcome 
of  that  exigency  set  at  naught  and  that  law  broken. 

5.  Our  position  gains  by  the  consideration,  that 
the  object,  in  the  contemplation  of  which  man's  soul 

I. 


i62      OF  THE  SANCTION   OF   THE  NATURAL   LAW. 

is  to  be  finally  and  perfectly  blessed  in  the  natural 
order,  is  the  Creator  seen  through  the  veils  of  His 
works,  (c.  ii.,  s.  iv.,  p.  21.)  This  mediate  vision  of  God, 
albeit  it  is  to  be  the  work  of  a  future  existence,  needs 
practice  and  preparation  in  this  life.  God  will  not  be 
discerned  by  the  man  who  has  not  been  accustomed 
to  look  for  Him.  He  will  not  be  seen  by  the  swine, 
who  with  head  to  earth  has  eaten  his  fill  of  sensual 
pleasures,  and  has  cared  for  nothing  better.  He 
will  not  be  seen  by  the  covetous  man  and  the 
oppressor,  who  never  identified  His  image  hidden 
away  under  the  labour-stained  dress  of  the  poor. 
He  will  not  be  seen  by  the  man,  who  never 
looked  up  into  His  face  in  prayer  here  below.  He 
will  not  be  seen  by  the  earth-laden  spirit,  that  cared 
nothing  at  all  for  God,  that  hated  the  mention  of 
His  name,  that  proclaimed  Him,  or  at  least  wished 
Him,  not  to  be  at  all. 

6.  It  will  be  said  that  this  argumentation  sup- 
poses the  habits  of  vice,  contracted  on  earth,  to 
remain  in  the  soul  after  departure :  but  there  is  no 
proof  of  that :  nay  of  some  vices — those  that  have 
more  to  do  with  the  body,  as  drunkenness — the 
habits  cannot  possibly  remain,  seeing  that  the 
appetite  wherein  they  were  resident  has  perished 
with  the  body.  First,  as  regards  the  instance  cited, 
I  reply  that  we  may  consider  drunkenness  in  two 
ways,  on  the  one  hand  as  a  turning  to  the  creature, 
on  the  other  as  a  turning  away  from  reason  and  the 
Creator.  The  craving  for  liquor  cannot  remain  in 
the  soul  after  death  exactly  as  it  was  before,  though 
it  probably  continues  in  some  analogous  form,  as 


TIVOFOLD   SANCTION,  NATURAL   AND   DIVINE     iC? 

a  thirst  fci  wild  and  irregular  excitement :  but  the 
loathing  and  horror  of  the  ways  of  reason  and  of 
God,  engendered  by  frequent  voluntary  intoxication, 
still  continues  in  the  soul.  And  from  this  observa- 
tion we  draw  the  general  answer,  that  whereas  in 
every  sin,  whether  sensual  or  spiritual,  the  most 
important  part  is  played  by  the  will,  and  the  will  is 
a  spiritual,  not  an  organic  faculty,  a  faculty  which  is 
a  main  element  of  the  soul  whether  in  or  out  of  the 
body, — therefore  the  evil  bent  and  inclination  of 
the  will,  which  sin  involves,  must  remain  even  in 
the  departed  spirit.  Lastly,  we  may  ask :  To  what 
purpose  is  our  free-will  given  us,  if  all  souls,  good 
and  bad  alike,  users  and  abusers  of  the  liberty  they 
had  on  earth,  enter  into  their  long  home  all  of  one 
uniform  and  spotless  hue  ? 

7.  Thus  then  it  comes  to  be,  by  order  of  nature 
and  good  consequence,  that  the  man  who  has  aban- 
doned God,  goes  without  God ;  and  he  who  has 
shunned  his  last  end  and  final  good,  arrives  not 
unto  it ;  and  he  who  would  not  go,  when  invited, 
to  the  feast,  eats  not  of  the  same  :  and  whoso  has 
withdrawn  from  God,  from  him  God  withdraws. 
"A  curse  he  loved,  and  it  shall  come  upon  him; 
and  he  would  not  have  a  blessing,  and  it  shall  be 
far  from  him.  He  put  on  the  curse  like  a  garment, 
and  it  has  gone  in  like  water  into  his  entrails,  and 
like  oil  into  his  bones, — like  a  garment  which 
covereth  him,  and  like  a  girdle  wherewith  he  is 
girded  continually."  (Psalm  cviii.  18,  19.) 

8.  Conversely,  we  might  argue  the  final  happi- 
ness which  attaches  to  the  observance  of  the  law  of 
nature,  (c.  ii.,  s.  v.,  p.  26.) 


i64      OF  THE  SANCTION   OF  THE  NATURAL  LAW. 

Readings. — St.  Thos.,   Cont.   Gent.,  iii.,  cc.  140, 
141,  143,  145. 

Section.  II. — Of  the  Finality  of  the  aforesaid  Sanction. 

I.  By  a  final,  as  distinguished  from  an  eternal 
state,  is  here  meant  the  last  state  of  existence  in 
a  creature,  whether  that  state  go  on  for  ever,  in 
which  case  it  is  final  and  eternal,  or  whether  it 
terminate  in  the  cessation  of  that  creature's  being, 
which  is  a  case  of  a  state  final,  but  not  eternal. 
Whether  the  unhappy  souls  of  men,  who  have 
incurred  the  last  sentence  of  the  natural  law,  shall 
exist  for  eternity,  is  not  a  question  for  philosophy  to 
decide  with  certainty.  The  philosopher  rules  every- 
thing a  priori,  showing  what  must  be,  if  something 
else  is.  Of  the  action  of  God  in  the  world,  he  can 
only  foretell  that  amount  which  is  thus  hypothetically 
necessary.  Some  divine  action  there  is,  of  which 
the  congruity  only,  not  the  necessity,  is  apparent  to 
human  eyes :  there  the  philosopher  can  tell  with 
probability,  but  not  with  certainty,  what  God  will 
do.  Other  actions  of  God  are  wholly  beyond  our 
estimate  of  the  reasons  of  them :  we  call  them 
simply  and  entirely  free.  In  that  sphere  philosophy 
has  no  information  to  render  of  her  own ;  she  must 
wait  to  hear  from  revelation  what  God  has  done, 
or  means  to  do.  Philosophers  have  given  reasons  of 
congruence,  as  they  call  them,  for  the  reprobate 
sinner  not  being  annihilated,  and  therefore  for  his 
final  punishment  being  eternal.  Those  reasons  go 
to  evince  the  probability  of  eternal  punishment, 
a  probability  which  is  deepened  into  certainty  by 


FINALITY  OF  AFORESAID  SANCTION.  165 

revelation.  We  shall  not  enter  into  them  here,  but 
shall  be  content  to  argue  that  a  term  is  set  to  the 
career  of  the  transgressor,  arrived  at  which  he  must 
leave  hope  behind  of  ever  winning  his  way  to  happi- 
ness, or  ever  leading  any  other  existence  than  one 
of  misery. 

2.  The  previous  question  has  shown  that  some 
punishment  must  attend  upon  violation  of  the 
natural  law.  Suppose  a  trangressor  has  suffered 
accordingly  for  a  certain  time  after  death,  what 
shall  be  done  with  him  in  the  end  ?  If  he  does  not 
continue  to  suffer  as  long  as  he  continues  to  be, 
then  one  of  three  things :  he  must  either  pass  into 
happiness,  or  into  a  new  state  of  probation,  or  his 
very  punishment  must  be  a  probation,  wherein  if  he 
behaves  well,  he  shall  be  rewarded  with  happiness 
at  last,  or  if  ill,  he  shall  continue  in  misery  until  he 
amend.  All  this  speculation,  be  it  understood,  lies 
apart  from  revelation.  If  then  the  sufferer  passed 
out  of  this  world,  substantially  and  in  the  main 
a  good  man,  it  is  not  unreasonable  that,  after  a 
period  of  expiatory  suffering  for  minor  delinquencies, 
he  should  reach  that  happiness  which  is  the  just 
reward  of  his  substantial  righteousness.  But  what 
of  him  who  closed  his  career  in  wickedness  exceed- 
ing great  ?  Mere  suffering  will  never  make  of  him  a 
good  man,  or  a  fit  subject  for  happiness.  But  the 
suffering  may  be  probationary,  and  he  may  amend 
himself  under  the  trial.  Against  that  hypothesis» 
philosophers  have  brought  a  priori  arguments  to  show- 
that  the  period  of  probation  must  end  with  the  separa- 
tion of  the  soul  from  the  body.    But  waiving  all  such 


i66     OF  THE  SANCTION   OF  THE  NATURAL  LAW. 


arguments,  let  us  suppose  that  there  might  be  proba- 
tion after  probation  even  in  the  world  to  come.  But 
some  human  souls  would  continue  obstinately  and 
unrepentingly  set  in  wickedness,  age  after  age,  and 
probation  after  probation :  for  the  possible  malice 
of  the  will  is  vastly  great.  What  is  to  become  of 
such  obstinate  characters?  It  seems  against  the 
idea  of  probation,  that  periods  of  trial  should 
succeed  one  another  in  an  endless  series.  It  would 
be  a  reasonable  rule  in  a  university,  that  an  under- 
graduate who  had  been  plucked  twenty-five  times, 
should  become  ineligible  for  his  degree.  Coming 
after  so  many  failures,  neither  would  the  degree  be 
any  ornament  to  him,  nor  he  to  the  university.  A 
soul  cannot  look  for  seasons  without  end  of  possible 
grace  and  pardon  to  shine  upon  it.  The  series  of 
probations  must  end  somewhere.  And  then  ?  We 
are  come  round  to  where  v/e  began.  When  all  the 
probation  is  over,  the  soul  is  found  either  in  con- 
formity with  the  natural  law,  which  means  ultimate 
happiness,  or  at  variance  with  the  law,  and  becomes 
miserable  with  a  misery  that  shall  never  terminate, 
unless  the  soul  itself  ceases  to  be. 

3.  It  may  be  asked,  how  much  conformity  to  the 
natural  law  is  requisite  and  sufficient,  to  exempt  a 
person  at  the  end  of  his  trial  from  a  final  doom  of 
misery,  or  to  ensure  his  lasting  happiness  ?  The 
question  resolves  itself  into  three : — how  do  sins 
differ  in  point  of  gravity  ?  is  grave  sin  ever  for- 
given ?  is  the  final  award  to  be  given  upon  the 
person's  whole  life,  a  balance  being  struck  between 
his  good  and  evil  deeds,  or  is  it  to  be  simply  upon 


FINALITY  OF  AFORESAID   SANCTION.  167 

his  moral  state  at  the  last  moment  of  his  career  of 
trial? 

4.  It  was  a  paradox  of  the  Stoics,  that  all 
offences  are  equal,  the  treading  down  of  your  neigh- 
bour's cabbage  as  heinous  a  crime  as  sacrilege. 
(Horace,  Satires,  i.,  3,  115 — iig.)  But  it  is  obvious 
that  there  is  a  vast  difference,  as  well  objectively 
in  the  matter  of  the  offence,  e.g.,  in  the  instance 
just  quoted  from  Horace,  as  also  subjectively  in  the 
degree  of  knowledge,  advertence,  and  will,  where- 
with the  offender  threw  himself  into  the  sin.  Thus 
offences  come  to  be  distinguished  as  grave  and  light: 
the  latter  being  such  as  with  a  human  master  would 
involve  a  reprimand,  the  former,  instant  dismissal. 
Final  misery  is  not  incurred  except  by  grave 
offending. 

5.  The  second  question,  whether  grave  sin  is 
ever  forgiven,  cannot  be  answered  by  philosophy. 
Of  course  the  sinner  may  see  by  the  light  of  reason 
his  folly  and  his  error,  and  thereby  conceive  some 
sort  of  sorrow  for  it,  and  retract,  and  to  some 
extent  withdraw  his  will  from  it  on  natural  grounds. 
This  amendment  of  sin  on  its  moral  and  philo- 
sophical side  may  deserve  and  earn  pardon  at 
human  hands.  But  the  offence  against  God  remains 
to  be  reckoned  for  with  God.  Now  God  is  not 
bound  to  forgive  without  receiving  satisfaction ;  and 
He  never  can  receive  due  satisfaction  from  man 
for  the  contempt  that  a  deliberate,  grave,  and 
flagrant  violation  of  the  moral  law  puts  upon  the 
Infinite  Majesty  of  the  Lawgiver.  The  first  thing 
that    revelation    has    to   teach   us   is  whether,  and 


i68      OF  THE   SANCTION   OF  THE  NATURAL  LAW, 

on  what  terms,  God  is  ready  to  pardon  grievous 
sin. 

6.  The  balance  between  deeds  good  and  evil  is 
not  struck  merely  at  the  instant  of  death.  It  is 
being  struck  continually ;  and  man's  final  destiny 
turns  on  how  that  balance  stands  at  the  close  of  his 
time  of  probation.  So  long  as  he  keeps  the  sub- 
stance of  the  moral  law,  the  balance  is  in  his  favour. 
But  one  downright  wilful  and  grievous  transgression 
outweighs  with  God  all  his  former  good  deeds.  It 
is  a  defiance  of  the  Deity,  a  greater  insult  than  all 
his  previous  life  was  a  service  and  homage.  It  is  as 
though  a  loyal  regiment  had  mutinied,  or  a  hitherto 
decent  and  orderly  citizen  were  taken  red-handed 
in  murder.  If  however  God  deigns  to  draw  the 
offender  to  repentance,  and  to  pardon  him,  the 
balance  is  restored.  Thus  everything  finally  depends 
on  man  being  free  from  guilt  of  grievous  trans- 
gression at  the  instant  of  death,  or  at  the  end  of  his 
period  of  probation,  whenever  and  wherever  that 
end  may  come. 

Reading. — Lessius,  Deperfectionibus  divinis,  1.  xiii., 
c.  xxvi.,  nn.  183,  seq. 

Section  III. — Of  Punishment  Retrospective  and  Retributive, 

I.  The  doctrine  of  the  last  section  might  stand 
even  in  the  mind  of  one  who  held  that  all  punish- 
ment is  probational,  and  destined  for  the  amend- 
ment of  him  who  undergoes  it,  to  humble  him,  to 
awaken  his  sense  of  guilt,  and  to  make  him  fear  to 
transgress  again.  On  this  theory  of  punishment, 
the  man  who  in  his  last  probational  suffering  refuses 


PUNISHMENT  RETROSPECTIVE  AND  RETRIBUTIVE.  169 

to  amend,  must  be  let  drop  out  of  existence  as  in- 
corrigible, and  so  clearly  his  final  state  is  one  of 
misery.  The  theory  is  not  inconsistent  with  final 
punishment,  but  with  eternal  punishment,  unless  in- 
deed we  can  suppose  a  creature  for  all  eternity  to 
refuse,  and  that  under  stress  of  torment,  a  standing 
invitation  to  repentance.  It  is  however  a  peculiar 
theory,  and  opposite  to  the  common  tradition  of 
mankind,  which  has  ever  been  to  put  gross  offenders 
to  death,  not  as  incorrigible,  not  simply  as  refuse  to 
be  got  rid  of,  but  that  their  fate  may  be  a  deterrent 
to  others.  Punishment,  in  this  view,  is  medicinal 
to  the  individual,  and  deterrent  to  the  community. 
Eternal  punishment  has  been  defended  on  the  score 
of  its  deterrent  force.  Both  these  functions  of 
punishment,  the  medicinal  and  the  deterrent  function, 
are  prospective.  But  there  is  asserted  a  third  func- 
tion, ^vhich  is  retrospective:  punishment  is  said  to 
be  retributive.  It  is  on  this  ground  that  the  justifica- 
tion of  eternal  punishment  mainly  rests.  We  are 
however  here  concerned,  not  with  that  eternity,  but 
in  an  endeavour  to  give  a  full  and  adequate  view  of 
punishment  in  all  its  functions. 

2.  If  punishment  is  never  retributive,  the  human 
race  in  all  countries  and  ages  has  been  the  sport  of 
a  strange  illusion.  Everyone  knows  what  vengeance 
means.  It  is  a  desire  to  punish  some  one,  or  to  see 
him  punished,  not  prospectively  and  with  an  eye  to 
the  future,  for  his  improvement,  or  as  a  warning  to 
others,  but  retrospectively  and  looking  to  the  past, 
that  he  may  suffer  for  what  he  has  done.  Is  then 
the   idea    of    vengeance    nothing    but   an    unclean 


I70     OF  THE  SANCTION   OF  THE  NATURAL   LAW. 

phantom  ?  Is  there  no  such  thing  as  vengeance  to 
a  right-minded  man  ?  Then  is  there  an  evil  element, 
an  element  essentially  and  positively  evil,  in  human 
nature.  No  one  will  deny  that  the  idea,  and  to 
some  extent  the  desire,  of  vengeance,  of  retaliation, 
of  retrospective  infliction  of  suffering  in  retribution 
for  evil  done,  of  what  we  learn  to  call  in  the  nursery 
tit  for  tat,  is  natural  to  mankind.  It  is  found  in  all 
men.     We  all  respond  to  the  sentiment : 

Mighty  Fates,  by  Heaven's  decree  accomplish, 

According  as  right  passes  from  this  side  to  that. 

For  hateful  speech  let  speech  of  hate  be  paid  back : 

Justice  exacting  her  due  cries  this  aloud  : 

For  murderous  blow  dealt  let  the  murderer  pay 

By  stroke  of  murder  felt 

Do  and  it  shall  be  done  unto  thee : 

Old  is  this  saying  and  old  and  old  again.* 

Nor  must  we  be  led  away  by  Mill  (Utilitarianism, 
c.  V.)  into  confounding  retaliation,  or  vengeance, 
with  self-defence.  Self-defence  is  a  natural  idea, 
also,  but  not  the  same  as  retaliation.  We  defend 
ourselves  against  a  mad  dog,  we  do  not  retaliate  on 
him.  Hence  we  must  not  argue  that,  because  self- 
defence  is  prospective,  therefore  so  is  vengeance. 

3.  A  thing  is  essentially  evil,  when  there  is  no 
possible  use  of  it  which  is  not  an  abuse.  Not  far 
different  is  the  conception  of  a  thing  positively  evil, 
evil,  that  is,  not  by  reason  of  any  deficiency,  or  by 
what  it  is  not,  but  evil  by  what  it  is  in  itself.  Such  an 

I  iEschylus,  Choephori,  316,  seq.  These  lines  embody  the  idea  on 
which  the  dramas  of  the  Shakespeare  of  Greece  are  principally 
founded.  But  when  was  a  work  of  the  highest  art  based  upon  an 
idea  unsound,  irrational  and  vicious  ? 


PUNISHMENT  RETROSPECTIVE  AND  RETRIBUTIVE.  171 


essential,  positive  evil  in  human  nature  would  venge- 
ance be,  a  natural  thing  for  which  there  was  no  natural 
use,  unless  punishment  may  in  some  measure  be 
retributive.  We  cannot  admit  such  a  flaw  in  nature. 
All  healthy  philosophy  goes  on  the  principle,  that 
what  is  natural  is  so  far  forth  good.  Otherwise 
we  lapse  into  Manicheism,  pessimism,  scepticism, 
abysses  beyond  the  reach  of  argument.  Vengeance 
undoubtedly  prompts  to  many  crimes,  but  so  does 
the  passion  of  love.  Both  are  natural  impulses. 
It  would  scarcely  be  an  exaggeration  to  set  down 
one  third  of  human  transgressions  to  love,  and 
another  third  to  revenge :  yet  it  is  the  abuse  in  each 
case,  not  the  use,  that  leads  to  sin.  If  the  matri- 
monial union  were  wicked  and  detestable,  as  the 
Manicheans  taught,  then  would  the  passion  of  love 
be  an  abomination  connatural  to  man.  Such  another 
enormity  would  be  the  affection  of  vengeance,  if 
punishment  could  never  rightly  be  retributive. 

4.  Aristotle,  Rhetoric,  I.,  x.,  17,  distinguishes  two 
functions  of  punishment  thus :  "  Chastisement  is 
for  the  benefit  of  him  that  suffers  it,  but  vengeance 
is  for  him  that  wreaks  it,  that  he  may  have  satisfac- 
tion." Add  to  this  the  warning  given  to  the  com- 
monwealth by  the  example  that  is  made  of  the 
offender,  and  we  have  the  three  functions  of  punish- 
ment, medicinal,  deterrefit,  and  retributive.  As  it  is 
medicinal,  it  serves  the  offender :  as  it  is  deterrent,  it 
serves  the  commonwealth  :  as  it  is  retributive,  it  serves 
the  offended  party,  being  a  reparation  offered  to  him. 
Now,  who  is  the  offended  party  in  any  evil  deed  ? 
So  far  as  it  is  a  sin  against  justice,  an  infringement 


172      OF   THE  SANCTION   OF  THE  NATURAL   LAW. 

of  any  man's  right,  he  is  the  offended  party.  He  is 
offended,  however,  not  simply  and  precisely  by  your 
violation  of  the  moral  law,  but  by  your  having,  in 
violation  of  that  law,  taken  away  something  that 
belonged  to  him.  Consequently,  when  you  make 
restitution  and  give  him  back  what  you  took  away, 
with  compensation  for  the  temporal  deprival  of  it, 
he  is  satisfied,  and  the  offence  against  him  is  re- 
paired. If  you  have  maliciously  burnt  his  house 
down,  you  bring  him  the  price  of  the  house  and 
furniture,  together  with  further  payment  for  the 
fright  and  for  the  inconvenience  of  being,  for  the 
present,  houseless.  You  may  do  all  that,  and  yet 
the  moral  guilt  of  the  conflagration  may  remain 
upon  your  soul.  But  that  is  no  affair  of  his :  he  is 
not  the  custodian  of  the  moral  law  :  he  is  not 
offended  by  your  sin,  formally  viewed  as  sin:  nor  has 
he  any  function  of  punishing  you,  taking  vengeance 
upon  you,  or  exacting  from  you  retribution  for  that. 
But  what  if  his  wife  and  children  have  perished, 
and  you  meant  them  so  to  perish,  in  the  fire  ?  Your 
debt  of  restitution  still  lies  in  the  matter  which  you 
took  away.  Of  course  it  is  a  debt  that  cannot  be 
paid.  You  cannot  give  back  his  "  pretty  chickens 
and  their  dam  "  whole  and  alive  again.  Still  your 
inability  to  pay  one  debt  does  not  make  you  liable 
to  that  creditor  for  another  debt,  which  is  part  of  a 
wholly  different  account.  He  is  not  offended  by, 
nor  are  you  answerable  to  him  for,  your  sin  in  this 
case  any  more  than  in  the  former. 

5.  We  may  do  an  injury  to  an  individual,  commit 
a  crime  against  the  State,  and  sin  against  God.    The 


PUNISHMENT  RETROSPECTIVE  AND  RETRIBUTIVE.  173 


injury  to  the  individual  is  repaired  by  restitution, 
not  by  punishment,  and  therefore  not  by  vengeance, 
which  is  a  function  of  punishment.  There  is  no 
such  thing  as  vengeance  for  a  private  wrong,  and 
therefore  we  have  the  precept  to  forgive  our  enemies, 
and  not  to  avenge  ourselves,  in  which  phrase  the 
emphasis  falls  on  the  word  ourselves.  The  clear 
idea  and  strong  desire  of  vengeance,  which  nature 
affords,  shows  that  there  is  such  a  thing  as  venge- 
ance to  be  taken  by  some  one :  it  does  not  warrant 
every  form  of  vengeance,  or  allow  it  to  be  taken  by 
each  man  for  himself.  It  consecrates  the  principle 
of  retribution,  not  every  application  of  the  principle. 
It  is  a  point  of  synderesis,  not  of  particular  conduct. 
The  reader  should  recall  what  was  said  of  the  ven- 
geance of  Hannibal  at  Himera.  (c.  viii.,  s.  ii.,  p.  144.) 
6.  It  belongs  to  the  State  to  punish  political  sin, 
or  crime,  and  to  God  to  punish  theological  sin,  which 
is  sin  properly  so  called,  a  breach  of  the  Eternal 
Law.  The  man  who  has  burnt  his  neighbour's 
house  down,  though  he  has  compensated  the  indi- 
vidual owner,  may  yet  be  punished  by  the  State. 
The  owner,  acting  in  his  capacity  as  citizen,  even 
when  he  has  been  compensated  as  an  individual, 
may  still  hand  him  over  to  the  State  for  punishment. 
The  arson  was  a  violation,  not  only  of  commutative, 
but  of /f^'a/ justice  (c.  v.,  s.  ix.,  nn.  3,  6,  pp.  103, 106),  a 
disturbance  of  the  public  peace  and  social  order,  an 
outrage  upon  the  majesty  of  the  law.  For  this  he  may 
be  punished  by  the  State,  which  is  the  guardian  of  all 
these  things,  and  which  has  jurisdiction  over  him 
to  make  laws  for  him,  and  to  enforce  their  sanction 


174      OP  T^^^  SANCTION  OF  THE  NATUR/IL   LAW. 

against  him.  Civil  punishment,  besides  being  deter- 
rent, is  retributive  for  the  breach  of  social  order.  It 
is  the  vengeance  of  the  commonwealth  upon  the 
disturber  of  the  public  peace.  Whether  the  State  can 
punish  on  pure  grounds  of  retribution,  away  from  all 
hope  or  need  of  deterring  possible  imitators  of  the 
crime,  is  a  question  irrelevant  to  our  present  enquiry. 
Probably  a  negative  answer  should  be  returned. 

7.  We  come  now  to  the  punishment  of  sin  by 
God,  the  Living  Reasonableness,  the  Head  of  the 
Commonwealth  of  Creation,  the  Legislator  of  the 
Eternal  Law,  the  Fountain  of  all  Jurisdiction,  Him 
in  whose  hands  rests  the  plenitude  of  the  power  to 
punish.  An  evil  deed  may  be  no  wrong  to  any  indi- 
vidual man,  no  crime  against  the  State,  but  it  must 
ever  be  an  offence  against  God.  It  is  a  departure 
from  the  order  of  man's  progress  as  a  reasonable 
being  (c.  v.,  s.  iii.,  n.  3,  p.  74 :  c.  vi.,  s.  i.,  nn.  i — 5, 
p.  109),  which  is  founded  on  the  nature  of  God 
Himself  (c.  vi.,  s.  i.,  n.  7,  p.  113),  of  which  order 
God  is  the  official  guardian  (c.  vi.,  s.  ii.,  nn.  8 — 10, 
p.  iig),  and  which  is  enjoined  by  God's  Eternal 
Law.  (c.  vii.,  n.  3,  p.  129.)  This  law  extends  to  all 
creation,  rational  and  irrational,  animate  and  inani- 
mate. It  bids  every  creature  work  according  to  his 
or  its  own  nature  and  circumstances.  Given  to  irra- 
tional beings,  the  law  is  simply  irresistible  and 
unfailing:  such  are  the  physical  laws  of  nature,  so 
many  various  emanations  of  the  one  Eternal  Law. 
Given  to  rational  creatures,  the  law  may  be  resisted 
and  broken  :  sin  is  the  one  thing  in  the  universe  that 
does  break  it.  (c.  vii.,  nn.  5 — 7,  p.  130.)   A  man  may  act 


PUNISHMENT  RETROSPECTIVE  AND  RETRIBUTIVE.  175 

in  disregard  of  the  Eternal  Law  on  one  or  other  of 

its  physical  sides,  and  so  much  the  worse  for  him, 

though  he  has  not  broken  the  law,  but  merely  ignored 

its  operation,  as  when  one  eats  what  is  unwholesome. 

Much  more  shall  he  suffer  for  having  broken  the 

law,    in    the    only    possible    way   that    it    can    be 

broken,  by  sin.     This  peculiar  violation  draws  after 

it   a   peculiar   consequence  of  suffering,  penal  and 

retributive.    If  a  man  gets  typhoid  fever  in  his  house, 

we  sometimes  say  it  is   a  ptmishment   on    him    for 

neglecting  his  drains,  even  when  the  neglect  was  a 

mere  piece  of  ignorance  or  inadvertence.     It  is  an 

evil    consequence    certainly, — the     law,    which    he 

thought  not  of,  working  itself  out  in  the   form  of 

disease.     But   it   is   not   properly   punishment :    no 

natural  law  has  been  really  broken  :   there  has  been 

no  guilt,  and  the  suffering  is  not   retributive   and 

compensatory.     It  does  not  go  to  restore  the  balance 

of  the  neglect.     It  is  a  lamentable  consequence,  not 

a  repayment.     As,  when  man  wrongs  his  fellow-man, 

he  makes  with  him  an  involuntary  contract  (c.  v.,  s.  ix., 

n.  6,  p.  106),  to  restore  what  he  takes  away:    so  in 

sinning  against  God,  man  makes  another  involuntary 

contract,  to  pay  back  in  suffering  against  his  will 

what  he  unduly  takes  in  doing  his  own  will  against 

the  will  of  the  Legislator.     As  St.  Augustine  says  of 

Judas  (Serm.  125,  n.  5) :    "  He  did  what  he  liked, 

but  he  suffered  what  he  liked   not.      In  his  doing 

what  he  liked,  his   sin   is   found :    in   his   suffering 

what    he   liked    not,   God's   ordinance  is    praised." 

Thus  it  is  impossible  for  the  Eternal  Law,  which 


176     OF  THE  SANCTION   OF   THE   NATURAL   LAW. 


bears  down  all  so  irresistibly  in  irrational  nature, 
finally  to  fail  of  its  effect  even  upon  the  most 
headstrong  and  contumacious  of  rational  creatures  ; 
but,  as  St.  Thomas  says  (la  2^,  q.  93,  art.  6, 
in  Corp.),  "The  defect  of  doing  is  made  up  by 
suffering,  inasmuch  as  they  suffer  what  the  Eternal 
Law  prescribes  for  them  to  the  extent  to  which  they 
fail  to  do  what  accords  with  the  Eternal  Law." 
And  St.  Anselm  {Cur  Dens  homo,  nn.  14,  15)  :  "  God 
cannot  possibly  lose  His  honour:  for  either  the 
sinner  spontaneously  pays  what  he  owes,  or  God 
exacts  it  of  him  against  his  will.  Thus  if  a  man 
chooses  to  fly  from  under  the  will  of  God  com- 
manding, he  falls  under  the  same  will  punishing." 
Punishment  is  called  by  Hegel,  "  the  other  half  of 
sin."  Lastly,  they  are  God's  own  spoken  words 
(Deut.  xxxii.  35) :  "  Vengeance  is  Mine,  I  will  repay." 

Readings. — St.  Thos.,  Cont.  Gent.,  iii.  140,  n.  5, 
Amplius;  ib.,  iii.,  144,  nn.  8,  Per  hoc,  and  9,  Est 
autem. 

For  Plato's  views  on  punishment  see  Protag.  324 
A,  B ;  Gorgias,  525  ;  Rep.  380  b,  615  ;  Phaedo,  113  e  ; 
Laws,  854  D ;  862  D,  e  ;  934  a  ;  957  e.  Plato 
recognizes  only  the  medicinal  and  the  deterrent  func- 
tions of  punishment,  and  ignores  the  retributive.  This 
is  not  to  be  wondered  at  in  one  who  wrote :  "  No 
one  is  wicked  voluntarily ;  but  it  is  an  evil  habit  of 
body  and  a  faulty  education  that  is  the  cause  of 
every  case  of  wickedness  "  (Tiviaeus,  86  e  ;  cf.  Laws, 
73'^  c,  d),  which  error  receives  a  masterly  confuta- 
tion in  Aristotle,  Ethics,  III.  v. 


CHAPTER   X. 

OF   UTILITARIANISM, 

f .  Though  the  name  utilitarian  is  an  English  growth 
of  this  century,  the  philosophy  so  called  probably 
takes  its  origin  from  the  days  when  man  first  began 
to  speculate  on  moral  matters.  Bentham  and  the 
two  Mills,  Austin,  and  George  Grote,  have  repeated 
in  England  the  substance  of  what  Protagoras  and 
Epicurus  taught  in  Greece,  two  thousand  years 
before.  It  is  the  system  of  Ethics  to  which  all 
must  incline,  who  ignore  the  spiritual  side  of  man's 
nature  and  his  hopes  of  a  better  world.  It  is  a 
morality  of  the  earth,  earthy. 

2.  Utilitarianism  has  not  been  formulated  like 
the  Athanasian  Creed.  It  is  impossible  to  state  it 
and  combat  it  in  a  form  to  which  all  Utilitarians 
will  subscribe.  Indeed,  it  is  an  amiable  weakness  of 
theirs,  when  confronted  with  the  grosser  conse- 
quences that  flow  from  their  theories,  to  run  off  to 
some  explanation,  true  enough,  but  quite  out  of 
keeping  with  the  primary  tenets  of  their  school. 
We  will  take  what  may  be  called  a  **  mean  reading  " 
of  the  indications  which  various  Utilitarian  thinkers 
afford  of  their  mind  and  philosophy.  These  authori- 
ties, then,  teach  two  main  heads  of  doctrine  : — 

M 


178  OF    UTILITARIANISM. 

(i)  That  the  last  end  and  final  good  of  man 
lies  in  this  world,  and  consists  in  the  greatest  happi- 
ness of  the  greatest  number  of  mankind,  happiness 
being  taken  to  mean  pleasure  as  well  of  the  senses 
as  of  the  understanding,  such  pleasure  as  can  be 
had  in  this  world,  along  with  immunity  from  pain. 
(Mill's  Utilitarianism,  2nd  Ed.,  pp.  9,  seq.) 

(2)  That  human  acts  are  right  or  wrongs  accord- 
ing as  they  are  useful  or  hurtful,  that  is,  according  as 
their  consequences  make  for  or  against  the  above- 
mentioned  end  of  social  happiness. 

3.  Consequences,  as  Utilitarians  very  properly 
point  out,  are  either  general  or  particular.  They  add 
that,  in  pronouncing  an  action  to  be  good  or  evil 
according  to  its  consequences,  they  mean  the 
general  and  not  the  particular  consequences.  In 
other  words,  they  bid  us  consider,  not  the  immediate 
results  of  this  action,  but  what  would  be  the  result  to 
society,  if  this  sort  of  action  were  generally  allowed. 
This  point  is  well  put  by  Paley  {Moral  Philosophy, 
bk.  ii.,  c.  vii.:  all  three  chapters,  vi.,  vii.,  viii.,  should 
be  read,  as  the  best  explanation  of  the  Principle  of 
General  Consequences) : 

"  You  cannot  permit  one  action  and  forbid 
another,  without  showing  a  difference  between 
them.  Consequently  the  same  sort  of  actions 
must  be  generally  permitted  or  generally  forbidden. 
Where,  therefore,  the  general  permission  of  them 
would  be  pernicious,  it  becomes  necessary  to  lay 
down  and  support  the  rule  which  generally  forbids 
them,  ,  .  ,  The  assassin  knocked  the  rich  villain 
on  the  head,  because  he  thought  him  better  out  of 


OF    UTILITARIANISM.  179 

the  way  than  in  it.  If  you  allow  this  excuse  in  the 
present  instance,  you  must  allow  it  to  all  who  act  in 
the  same  manner,  and  from  the  same  motive ;  that 
is,  you  must  allow  every  man  to  kill  any  one  he 
meets,  whom  he  thinks  noxious  or  useless :  .  .  .  a 
disposition  of  affairs  which  would  soon  fill  the  world 
with  misery  and  confusion,  and  ere  long  put  an  end 
to  human  society." 

My  contention  is,  not  with  the  Principle  of 
General  Consequences,  which  has  a  certain  value 
in  Ethics,  and  is  used  by  many  writers  other  than 
Utilitarian,  but  with  the  two  stated  above,  n.  2, 
which  are  called  the  Greatest  Happiness  Principle 
and  the  Principle  of  Utility. 

4.  Against  the  Greatest  Happiness  Principle  I 
have  these  complaints : 

(i)  Utilitarians  from  Paley  to  John  Stuart  Mill 
aver  that  their  teaching  is  no  bar  to  any  man  hoping 
for  and  striving  after  the  happiness  of  the  world  to 
come.  They  say  that  such  happiness  cannot  be 
better  attained  than  by  making  it  your  principal 
aim  to  improve  all  temporal  goods  and  dissipate 
all  temporal  evil.  Their  maxim  in  fact  is :  '  Take 
care  of  the  things  of  earth,  and  the  things  of 
heaven  will  take  care  of  themselves.'  Whereas  it 
was  the  very  contrary  teaching  of  Him,  whom 
moderns,  who  see  in  Him  no  higher  character,  still 
love  to  call  the  greatest  of  moral  teachers :  "  That 
which  fell  among  thorns  are  they  who  have  heard, 
and  going  their  way,  are  choked  with  the  cares  and 
riches  and  pleasures  of  this  life,  and  yield  no  fruit." 
(St.  Luke  viii.  14.) 


r8o  OF   UTILITARIANISM. 

(2)  It  will  be  said  that  these  thorns  grow  of  selfish- 
ness,  and  that  these  cares  are  the  cares  of  individual 
interest,  whereas  the  Utilitarian's  delight  and  glory  is 
to  live,  not  for  himself,  but  for  the  commonwealth. 
But  how  can  a  man,  who  takes  pleasure  to  be  his 
highest  good  and  happiness,  live  otherwise  than  for 
himself?  Here  we  come  upon  the  unobserved  fault 
and  flaw,  which  entirely  vitiates  the  Utihtarian 
structure.  It  is  an  union  of  two  opposite  and  in- 
compatible elements.     An  old  poet  has  said  ; 

Vinegar  and  oil  in  one  same  vessel  pour, 
They  stand  apart,  unfriendly,  all  the  more, 

(^schylus,  Agam.,  330,  331.) 

Utilitarianism  consists  of  a  still  more  unfriendly 
and  unwholesome  mixture  of  two  elements,  both  of 
them  bad,  and  unable  to  stand  together.  Hedonism 
and  Altruism.  Hedonism  is  the  doctrine  that  the 
main  object  and  end  of  life  is  pleasure  :  which  is  the 
position  laid  down  in  so  many  words  by  Mill  (1.  c), 
that  "  actions  are  right  in  proportion  as  they  tend 
to  promote  happiness ;  and  "  by  happiness  is  in- 
tended pleasure  and  the  absence  of  pain."  If 
Hedonism  were  sound  doctrine,  the  Pleasant  and 
the  Good  would  be  identical,  and  the  most  pleasant 
pleasure  would  ever  be  the  best  pleasure.  That 
would  take  away  all  distinction  of  kijid  or  quality 
among  pleasures,  and  differentiate  them  only  by 
intensity  and  duration.  This  was  Paley's  doctrine, 
a  fundamental  point  of  Hedonism,  and  therefore  also 
of  the  Utilitarian  philosophy.  John  Mill,  very  honour- 
ably to  himself,  but  very  fatally  to  the  system  that  he 
was  writing  to  defend,  parted  company  with  Paley. 


OF   UTILITARIANISM.  181 

We  have  argued  against  Paley  (c.  iv.,  s.  iii.,  nn.  3 — 5, 
p.  55),  that  there  is  a  better  and  a  worse  in  pleasures, 
quite  distinct  from  the  more  or  less  pleasurable,  even 
if  that  more  be  taken  in  the  long  run  in  this  world. 

Again  it  may  be  considered  that  pleasure,  even 
the  best  and  highest,  is  a  sort  of  efflorescence 
from  activity,  and  is  for  activity,  not  activity  for 
it ;  and  better  is  the  activity,  whatever  it  be,  than 
the  pleasure  which  comes  thereof;  wherefore  no 
pleasure,  as  pleasure,  can  be  the  highest  good  and 
happiness  of  man. 

Hedonism  then  is  an  error.  But  errors  may  be 
opposed  to  one  another  as  well  as  to  the  truth. 
Hedonism  is  opposed  to  Altruism  in  this  way.  A 
man  may  take  pleasure  in  seeing  other  people  enjoy 
themselves.  Nothing  is  more  common,  except  the 
pleasure  taken  in  enjoying  one's  own  self.  But  if  a 
man  only  feeds  the  hungry  that  he  may  have  the 
satisfaction  of  seeing  them  eat,  is  it  the  hungry  or 
himself  that  he  finally  seeks  to  gratify  ?  Clearly, 
himself.  That  is  the  behaviour  of  the  Hedonist,  he 
acts  for  his  own  pleasure  even  in  his  benevolence. 
The  Altruist,  on  the  contrary,  professes  never  to  act 
for  self,  but  for  society.  So  that  society  flourish,  he 
is  ready  to  be  crushed  and  ruined,  not  in  the  matter 
of  his  pleasure  only,  but  even  in  that  of  his  own 
good.  Selfishness,  by  which  he  means  all  manner 
of  regard  to  self,  is,  upon  his  conscience,  the  unfor- 
given  sin.  But  Hedonism  is  selfishness  in  the 
grossest  form,  being  the  mere  pursuit  in  all  tilings  of 
pleasurable  feeling — feeling  being  always  particular 
and   limited   to   self,  in   contradistinction  to  good, 


i8a  OF    UTILITARIANISM. 

which  is  universal  and  diffuses  itself  all  round.  The 
Hedonist  seeks  his  own  pleasure,  where  the  Altruist 
forbids  him  to  take  thought,  let  alone  for  his  grati- 
fication, but  even  for  his  good.  Thus  an  Hedonist 
cannot  be  Altruist  to  boot ;  and,  trying  to  combine 
the  two  characters,  the  Utilitarian  is  committed  to  a 
self-contradiction. 

If  he  relinquishes  Hedonism,  and  holds  to  Altruism, 
pure  and  simple,  his  position  is  not  much  improved. 
Altruism  overlooks  the  fact,  that  man,  as  compared 
with  other  men,  is  a  person,  the  centre  of  his  own 
acts,  njt  a  thing,  to  be  entirely  referred  to  others. 
He  is  in  relation  with  others,  as  child,  father, 
husband,  master,  citizen  ;  but  these  relations  do  not 
take  up  the  whole  man.  There  is  a  residue  within, — 
an  inner  being  and  life,  which  is  not  referable  to  any 
creature  outside  himself,  but  only  to  the  Creator.  For 
this  inner  being,  man  is  responsible  to  God  alone. 
The  good  of  this,  the  "  inner  man  of  the  heart,"  is 
each  individual's  proper  and  primary  care.  Altruism, 
and  Utilitarianism  with  it,  ignore  the  interior  life 
of  the  soul,  and  substitute  human  society,  that  is, 
ultimately,  the  democratic  State,  in  place  of  God. 

(3)  Another  confusion  that  the  Greatest  Happi- 
ness Principle  involves,  is  the  mistaking  the  political 
for  the  ethical  end  of  life.  The  political  end,  which 
it  is  the  statesman's  business  to  aim  at,  and  the 
citizen's  duty  to  subserve,  is  "  the  natural  happiness 
of  the  commonwealth,  and  of  individuals  as  members 
of  the  commonwealth,  that  they  may  live  in  it  in 
peace  and  justice,  and  with  a  sufficiency  of  goods  for 
the  preservation  and  comfort  of  bodily  life,  and  with 


OF   UTILITARIANISM.  183 

that  amount  of  moral  rectitude  which  is  necessary 
for  this  outward  peace  and  preservation  of  the  com- 
monwealth, and  the  perpetuity  of  the  human  race." 
(Suarez,  De  Legibus,  III.,  xi.,  7.)  This  is  all  the  good 
that  the  Utilitarian  contemplates.  He  is  satisfied  to 
make  a  good  citizen,  a  good  husband,  a  good  father, 
for  the  transactions  of  this  life.  He  has  no  concern 
to  make  a  good  man  up  to  the  ethical  standard, 
which  supposes  the  observance  of  the  whole  natural 
law,  duties  to  God,  and  duties  within  himself,  as  well 
as  duties  to  human  society,  and  by  this  observance 
the  compassing  of  the  everlasting  happiness  of  the 
man's  own  individual  soul. 

Against  the  Principle  of  Utility  I  find  these 
charges : 

(i)  It  takes  the  sign  and  indication  cf  moral  evil 
for  the  evil  itself,  as  if  the  physician  should  take  the 
symptom  for  the  disease.  It  places  the  wickedness 
of  an  act  in  the  physical  misery  and  suffering  that 
are  its  consequences.  This  is,  I  say,  a  taking  of  the 
indication  for  the  thing  indicated.  An  act  is  bad  in 
itself  and  by  itself,  as  being  a  violation  of  the  rational 
nature  of  the  doer  (c.  vi.,  s.  i.),  and  being  bad,  it 
breeds  bad  consequences.  But  the  badness  of  the 
act  is  moral ;  the  badness  of  the  consequences,  phy- 
sical. There  is  an  evident  intrinsic  irrationality, 
and  thereby  moral  evil,  in  such  sins  as  intemperance, 
peevishness,  and  vanity.  But  let  us  take  an  instance 
of  an  act,  apparently  harmless  in  itself,  and  evil 
solely  because  of  the  consequences.  Supposing  one 
insists  upon  playing  the  piano  for  his  own  amuse- 
ment, to  the  disturbance  of  an  invalid  who  is  lying 


184  <^^    UTILITARIANISM. 

in  a  critical  state  in  the  next  room.  Do  the  mere 
consequences  make  this  otherwise  innocent  amuse- 
ment evil  ?  Yes,  if  you  consider  the  amusement  in 
the  abstract :  but  if  you  take  it  as  this  human  act,  the 
act  is  inordinate  and  evil  in  itself,  or  as  it  is  elicited 
in  the  mind  of  the  agent.  The  volition  amounts  to 
this :  *  I  prefer  my  amusement  to  my  neighbour's 
recovery,'  which  is  an  act  unseemly  and  unreasonable 
in  the  mind  of  a  social  being.  Utilitarians  fall  into 
the  capital  error  of  ignoring  the  intrinsic  value  of 
an  act,  and  estimating  it  wholly  by  extrinsic  results, 
because  they  commonly  follow  the  phenomenalist 
philosophy,  which  breaks  away  from  all  such  ideas 
as  substance  and  nature,  and  regards  nothing  but 
sequences  and  coexistences  of  phenomena.  To  a 
phenomenalist  the  precept.  Live  up  to  thy  nature,  can 
have  no  meaning. 

(2)  Aristotle  {Ethics,  II.,  iv.,  3)  draws  this  distinc- 
tion between  virtue  and  art,  that  "  the  products  of 
art  have  their  excellence  in  themselves :  it  suffices 
therefore  that  they  are  of  this  or  that  quality :  but 
acts  of  virtue  are  not  done  virtuously  according  to 
the  quahty  of  the  thing  done,  but  according  to  the 
state  of  mind  of  the  doer ;  first,  according  to  his 
knowledge  of  what  he  was  about ;  then,  according 
to  his  volition,  as  that  was  guided  or  not  guided 
by  the  proper  motives  of  the  virtue ;  thirdly,  accord- 
ing to  the  steadiness  and  fixedness  of  his  will ; 
whereas  all  these  considerations  are  of  no  account 
in  a  work  of  art,  except  the  single  one  of  the  artist 
being  aware  of  what  he  was  about."  Elsewhere 
{Ethics,  VI,,  iv.,  2),  he  says  that  virtue  is  distinguished 


OF   UTILITARIANISM.  183 

from  art  as  being  action,  not  production.  The  Prin- 
ciple of  Utility  confounds  virtue  with  art,  or  perhaps 
I  should  say,  with  manufactures.  It  judges  conduct, 
as  one  would  shoemaking,  by  trial  of  the  product, 
or  net  result.  So  far  from  being  solicitous,  with 
Aristotle,  that  volition  should  be  "  guided  by  the 
proper  motives  of  the  virtue"  which  there  is  question 
of  practising  (c.  v.,  s.  viii.,  n.  4,  p.  96 :  Ar.  Eth.,  III., 
viii.).  Mill  (Utilitarianism,  p.  26)  tells  us  that  "  utili- 
tarian moralists  have  gone  beyond  almost  all  others 
in  affirming  that  the  motive  has  nothing  to  do  with 
the  morality  of  the  action."  By  motive  he  under- 
stands what  we  have  called  the  end  in  view.  (c.  iii., 
s.  ii.,  n.  2,  p.  31.)  So  that,  if  one  man  waits  on  the 
sick  for  the  love  of  God,  and  another  in  hope  of  a 
legacy,  the  morality  of  these  two  acts  is  the  same, 
just  as  it  makes  no  difference  to  the  usefulness  of  a 
pair  of  boots,  what  motive  it  was  that  set  the  shoe- 
maker to  work.  True,  Mill  admits  that  the  motive 
has  *'  much  to  do  with  the  worth  of  the  agent :  " 
but  that,  he  hastens  to  explain,  is  inasmuch  as  *'  it 
indicates  ...  a  bent  of  character  from  which  useful, 
or  from  which  hurtful  actions  are  likely  to  arise." 
Even  so, — the  shoemaker  who  works  to  earn  money 
for  a  carousal,  is  not  likely  to  go  on  producing 
useful  articles  so  long  as  another,  who  labours  to 
supprvt  his  family.  Such  is  the  moral  difference 
that  Mill  places  between  the  two  men  ;  one  instru- 
ment of  production  is  longer  available  than  the 
other. 

(3)  Another  well  established  distinction  is  that 
between  hartn  and   injury,  injury  being  wilful  and 


1 86  OF    UTILITARIANISM. 

unjust  harm.  The  housemaid,  who  in  arranging  the 
room  has  burned  your  manuscript  of  "  sugared 
sonnets,"  has  done  you  no  injury,  for  she  meant 
none,  but  how  vast  the  harm  to  the  author  and  to 
mankind  !  Harm  is  visible  in  the  effects  :  but  injury 
only  upon  examination  of  the  mind  of  the  agent. 
Not  so,  however,  the  Utilitarian  thinks :  harm  being 
equal,  he  can  make  no  difference  between  a  tyrant 
and  a  man-eating  tiger.  Thus  George  Grote  says  of 
a  certain  murderous  usurper  of  the  kingdom  of 
Macedon :  **  You  discover  nothing  while  your  eye 
is  fixed  on  Archelaus  himself.  .  .  .  But  when  you 
turn  to  the  persons  whom  he  has  killed,  banished, 
or  ruined — to  the  mass  of  suffering  that  he  has 
inflicted — and  to  the  widespread  insecurity  which 
such  acts  of  iniquity  spread  through  all  societies 
where  they  become  known — there  is  no  lack  of  argu- 
ment which  prompts  a  reflecting  spectator  to  brand 
him  as  [a  most  dangerous  and  destructive  animal, 
no]  z.  disgraceful  man."  (Grote's  Plato,  ii.,  p.  io8.) 
Why  Archelaus  is  described  in  terms  of  the  tiger, 
and  then  branded  as  a  disgraceful  man,  we  are  at  a 
loss  to  conceive,  except  in  this  way,  that  the  writer's 
philosophy  forsook  him  at  the  end  of  the  sentence, 
and  he  reverted  to  the  common  sense  of  mankind. 
But  he  should  have  either  ended  the  sentence  as 
suggested  in  the  parenthesis,  or  have  been  willing  to 
call  the  man-eater  of  the  Indian  jungle,  who  has 
"learned  to  make  widows,  and  to  lay  waste  their 
cities,"  a  disgraceful  tiger ;  or  lastly,  he  should  have 
looked  back,  where  he  declared  it  was  vain  to 
look,  upon  Archelaus  himself,  and  discerned  in  him 


OF    UTILI'IARIANISM.  187 

that  moral  deformity,  and  contradiction  of  reason, 
whereof  a  brute  beast  is  incapable,  but  which  is  a 
disgrace  and  a  stain  upon  humanity. 

A  later  writer,  who  presses  Utilitarianism  into  the 
service  of  Socialism,  is  plainer-spoken  than  Grote, 
and  says  bluntly  :  "  To  be  honestly  mistaken  avails 
nothing.  Thus  Herbert  Spencer — who  is  under  the 
delusion  that  we  have  come  into  this  world  each  for 
the  sake  of  himself,  and  who  opposes,  as  far  as  he 
can,  the  evolution  of  society — is  verily  an  immoral 
man.  .  .  .  Right  is  every  conduct  which  tends 
to  the  welfare  of  society  ;  wrong,  what  obstructs 
that  welfare."  {Gronlund,  Co-operative  Commonwealth, 
pp.  226,  227.)  Thus  is  overlaid  the  difference 
between  harm  and  injury,  between  physical  and 
moral  evil:  thus  is  the  meaning  of  a  human  act 
ignored  :  in  this  abyss  of  chaos  and  confusion, 
which  Utilitarianism  has  opened  out.  Moral  Philo- 
sophy finds  her  grave. 

(4)  The  Principle  of  Utility  sees  in  virtue  a  habit 
of  self-sacrifice,  useful  to  the  community,  but  not 
naturally  pleasant,  and  therefore  not  naturally  good 
and  desirable,  to  him  that  practises  it,  but  made 
pleasurable  and  good  and  desirable  to  him  by 
practice.  (Mill,  pp.  53 — 57.)  In  this  way  virtue 
becomes  naturally  a  very  good  thing  for  every  one 
else  but  its  possessor,  but  to  him  it  is  a  natural  evil, 
inasmuch  as  it  deprives  him  of  pleasure,  which 
natural  evil  by  habit  is  gradually  converted  into  a 
factitious  and  artificial  good,  the  man  becoming 
accustomed  to  it,  as  the  proverb  says,  "  like  eels  to 
skinning."     This  theory  is  the  resuscitation  of  one 


j88  of   utilitarianism. 


current  among  the  Sophists  at  Athens,  and  described 
by  Plato  thus. — The  natural  good  of  man  is  to  afford 
himself  every  indulgence,  even  at  the  expense  of  his 
neighbours.  He  follows  his  natural  good  accord- 
ingly :  so  do  his  neighbours  follow  theirs,  and  try  to 
gratify  themselves  at  his  expense.  Fights  ensue, 
till  mankind,  worried  and  wearied  with  fighting, 
make  a  compact,  each  to  give  up  so  much  of  his 
natural  good  as  interferes  with  that  of  his  neighbour. 
Human  society,  formed  on  this  understanding,  en- 
forces the  compact  in  the  interest  of  society.  Thus 
the  interest  of  society  is  opposed  to  the  interest  of 
the  individual,  in  this  that  it  keeps  him  out  of  his 
best  natural  good,  which  is  to  do  as  his  appetite  of 
pleasure  bids  him  in  all  things,  though  it  compensates 
him  with  a  second-class  good,  by  preventing  his 
neighbours  from  pleasure-hunting  at  his  expense. 
If  then  his  neighbours  could  be  restrained,  and  he 
left  free  to  gratify  himself,  that  would  be  perfect 
bliss.  But  only  a  despot  here  or  there  has  attained 
to  it.  The  ordinary  man  must  pay  his  tax  of  virtue 
to  the  community,  a  loss  to  him,  but  a  gain  to  all 
the  rest :  while  he  is  compensated  by  the  losses 
which  their  virtue  entails  upon  them. 

Such  was  the  old  Athenian  theory,  which  John 
Mill,  the  Principle  of  Utility  in  his  hand,  completes 
by  saying  that  by-and-bye,  and  little  by  little  (as  the 
prisoner  of  Chillon  came  to  love  his  dungeon),  the 
hampered  individual  comes  to  love,  and  to  find  an 
artificial  happiness  in,  those  restrictions  of  his 
liberty,  which  are  called  Virtue. 

It  was  against  this  theory  that  Plato  wrote  his 


OP   UTILITARIANISM.  tSg 


Republic,  and,  to  compare  a  little  thing  to  a  great, 
the  whole  account  of  moral  good  being  in  consonance 
with  nature,  and  of  moral  obligation  rising  out  of  the 
nature  of  the  individual  man,  as  has  been  set  forth 
in  this  brief  Text-book,  may  serve  for  a  refutation 
of  the  perverse  doctrine  of  Utilitarianism. 

Readings. — Plato,  Republic,  pp.  33S  e,  339  a,  343 

C,  D,  E,  344  A.  B,  C,  358  E,  359  A,  B,  580  B,  C. 


MORAL    PHILOSOPHY. 


Part   III.     Natural   Law. 


We  assume  in  Natural  Law  the  preceding  treatise 
on  Ethics,  and  also  the  principal  truths  of  Natural 
Theology. 


CHAPTER   I. 

OF  DUTIES   OF   GOD. 

Section  I. — Of  the  Worship  of  God. 

I.  Worship  is  divided  into  prayer  and  praise.  To 
pray,  and  present  our  petitions  to  the  Most  High,  is 
a  privilege  ;  a  privilege,  however,  which  we  are  bound 
to  use  at  times,  as  the  necessary  means  for  over- 
coming temptations  and  inchnations  to  evil.  We 
praise  and  adore  God  for  His  sovereign  excellence, 
which  excellence,  nevertheless,  would  found  in  us  no 
positive  duty  if  we  stood  free  of  all  dependence  upon 
God.  In  such  an  hypothesis  we  should  lie  simply 
under  the  negative  duty  of  not  thinking  of  God, 
speaking  of  Him,  or  acting  towards  Him  otherwise 


192  OF  DUTIES  TO   GOD. 

-  -  ■  ■  ■  -  -     ■  —  - 

than  with  all  reverence.  So  we  should  behave  to 
the  Great  Stranger,  with  civility,  with  admiration 
even  and  awe,  but  not  with  cordiality,  not  with 
loyalty,  not  with  homage,  not  with  love.  Very 
different  are  our  relations  and  our  duties  to  God 
our  Lord,  "  in  whom  we  live,  move,  and  have  our 
being."  There  is  nothing  in  us  or  about  us,  no  positive 
perfection  of  ours  whatsoever,  that  is  not  His  gift, 
and  a  gift  that  He  is  not  giving  continually,  else  it 
would  be  lost  to  us.  We  are  therefore  bound  in 
His  regard,  not  merely  to  abstention  but  to  act. 
And  first,  for  inward  acts,  we  must  habitually  feel, 
and  at  notable  intervals  we  must  actually  elicit, 
sentiments  of  adoration  and  praise,  of  thanksgiving, 
of  submission,  of  loyalty  and  love,  as  creatures  to 
their  Creator,  and  as  vassals  to  their  very  good 
Lord,  for  He  is  our  Creator  and  Lord  in  the 
natural  order,  not  to  say  anything  here  of  the 
supernatural  filiation,  by  which,  as  the  Church  says, 
"  we  dare  "  to  call  God  "  Our  Father." 

2.  We  must  also  express  these  sentiments  by 
outward  act.  All  the  signs  of  reverence,  which  man 
pays  to  his  human  superior,  must  be  paid  to  God 
"  with  advantages  "  :  bowing  passes  into  prostra- 
tion, uncovering  the  head  into  kneeling,  kissing  the 
hand  into  offering  of  incense  :  not  that  these  par- 
ticular developments  are  necessary,  but  some  such 
development  must  take  place.  We  shall  not  be 
content  to  think  reverential  thoughts,  but  we  shall 
say,  or  even  sing,  great  things  of  God's  greatness 
and  our  indebtedness  and  duty :  such  a  vocal 
exercise    is    psalmody.       We    shall     represent    in 


WORSHIP  OF  GOD.  193 

symbolic  action  our  dependence  on  the  Lord  of 
life  and  death,  and  also  our  sinfulness,  for  which 
He  might  justly  strike  us  dead ;  such  a  representa- 
tion is  sacrifice. 

3,  All  this  we  must  do,  first,  for  the  sake  of  our 
own  souls,  minds  and  hearts,  to  quicken  the  inward 
sentiment  of  adoration  and  praise.  "  Worship, 
mostly  of  the  silent  sort,"  worship,  that  finds  no 
expression  in  word  or  gesture, — worship  away  from 
pealing  organs  and  chants  of  praise,  or  the  simpler 
music  of  the  human  voice,  where  no  hands  are 
uplifted,  nor  tongues  loosened,  nor  posture  of 
reverence  assumed,  becomes  with  most  mortals  a 
vague,  aimless  reverie,  a  course  of  distraction, 
dreaminess,  and  vacancy  of  mind,  no  more  worth 
than  the  meditations  of  the  Lancashire  stone- 
breaker,  who  was  asked  what  he  thought  of  during 
his  work, — "  Mostly  nowt." 

4.  Again,  what  the  body  is  to  the  soul,  that  is 
exterior  devotion  to  interior.  From  the  soul  interior 
devotion  springs,  and  through  the  body  it  manifests 
itself.  Exterior  devotion,  without  the  inward  spirit 
that  quickens  it,  is  worship  unprofitable  and  dead : 
it  tends  at  once  to  corruption,  like  the  body  when 
the  soul  has  left  it.  Interior  devotion,  on  the  other 
hand,  can  exist,  though  not  with  its  full  complement, 
without  the  exterior.  So  that  it  is  only  in  the  union 
of  the  two  together  that  perfect  worship  is  given  to 
God  by  men  as  men.  Upon  which  St.  Thomas  has 
this  naive  remark,  that  "  they  who  blame  bodily 
observances  being  paid  to  God,  evidently  fail  to 
remember  that  they  themselves  are  men." 

N 


194  OF   DUTIES    TO    GOD. 

Thus  we  pay  tithe  to  God  for  soul  and  body, 
by  acts  of  religion  interior  and  exterior.  But  man 
is,  under  God,  the  lord  of  this  earth  and  of  the 
fulness  thereof.  He  must  pay  tithe  for  that  too  by 
devoting  some  portion  of  it  to  the  direct  service  oi 
God,  to  whom  it  all  primarily  belongs.  For  "  mine 
is  the  gold  and  mine  the  silver."  (Aggeus  ii.  g.)  Such 
are  the  words  that  God  spoke  through  His  prophet 
to  incite  His  people  to  restore  his  sanctuary. 

6.  It  is  therefore  not  true  to  say  that  the  sole 
reason  of  outward  worship  is  to  move  the  wor- 
shipper to  interior  devotion.  It  is  not  true  that 
St.  Peter's  at  Rome,  and  Cologne  Cathedral,  and 
the  Duomo  of  Milan,  with  all  their  wealth  and 
elaborate  ceremonial,  exist  and  are  kept  up  solely 
because,  things  of  earth  as  we  are,  we  cannot  be 
depended  upon  to  praise  God  lovingly  within  the 
white-washed  walls  of  a  conventicle,  or  according 
to  the  simple  ritual  of  the  Society  of  Friends.  We 
would  not,  even  if  we  could,  pray  habitually  among 
such  surroundings,  where  we  could  afford  to  better 
them.  We  have  before  us  the  principle  of  St. 
Thomas  (la  2Sd,  q.  24,  art.  3,  in  corp.)  : 

"  Since  man's  good  consists  in  reason  as  in  its 
root,  the  more  actions  proper  to  man  are  performed 
under  the  direction  of  reason,  the  more  perfect  will 
man's  good  be.  Hence  no  one  doubts  that  it  belongs 
to  the  perfection  of  moral  good,  that  the  actions  of 
our  bodily  members  should  be  directed  by  the  law 
of  reason,  ...  as  also  that  the  passions  of  the 
soul  should  be  regulated  by  reason." 

This  means,  not  merely  that  if  the  bodily  members 


WORSHIP   OF  GOD.  193 


or  the  passions  stir  at  all,  it  is  a  good  and  desirable 
thing  for  them  to  be  ruled  by  reason  ;  but  further 
that  it  is  a  positive  addition  to  human  perfection 
that  they  should  stir  and  be  active,  provided  reason 
guide  them.  {Ethics,  c.  iv.,  s.  i.,  n.  6,  p.  45.) 

It  certainly  is  an  action  proper  to  man  to  express 
in  gesture,  in  voice,  in  concert  and  company  with 
his  fellow-men,  and  by  employment  of  whatever  is 
best  and  fairest  and  brightest  under  his  command 
in  the  material  creation,  his  inward  affections  of 
loyalty,  of  homage  and  devotion,  of  awe  and 
reverence,  of  gratitude  and  love  to  his  Creator. 

Good  as  these  affections  are  in  the  heart  of  the 
worshipper,  they  receive  an  external  complement  of 
goodness  and  perfection  by  being  blazoned  forth  in 
vocal  utterance,  singing,  bending  of  knees, — by  the 
erection  and  embellishment  of  temples,  and  offerings 
of  gold,  silver,  precious  stones,  and  incense, — and 
by  men  thronging  those  temples  in  multitudes  for 
social  worship, — provided  always  that  the  inward 
devotion  of  the  heart  be  there,  to  put  a  soul  into 
these  outward  demonstrations  and  offerings. 

7.  Concerning  these  religious  observances  interior 
and  exterior,  it  is  as  idle  to  pretend  that  they  are 
useful  to  Almighty  God  as  it  is  irrelevant  to  object 
that  they  are  useless  to  Him.  Of  course  they  are 
useless  to  Him.  All  creation  is  useless  to  God.  A 
Being  who  can  never  receive  any  profit,  increment, 
or  gain,  dwells  not  within  the  region  of  utilities. 
Theologians  indeed  distinguish  between  intrinsic 
and  extrinsic  glory,  that  is,  between  the  glory  which 
God  gives  Himself  by  His   own  contemplation  of 


X96  OF   DUTIES   TO   GOD. 

His  own  essence,  and  the  glory  which  His  creatures 
give  Him.  They  say  that  God  is  thus  capable  of 
extrinsic  increment,  to  which  increment  the  praise 
and  worship  of  His  creatures  is  useful.  But,  after 
all,  they  are  fain  to  avow  that  the  whole  of  this 
extrinsic  increment  and  glory  is  no  real  gain  to  God, 
giving  Him  nothing  but  what  He  had  before  in  an 
infinitely  more  excellent  mode  and  manner  from 
and  of  Himself.  Thus  it  appears  that  the  extrinsic 
glory  of  God,  to  which  the  worship  paid  Him  by 
man  contributes,  is  valued,  not  because  it  is  properly 
useful  to  Him,  but  because  He  is  most  properly  and 
highly  worthy  of  it.  **  Thou  art  worthy,  O  Lord 
our  God,  to  receive  glory  and  honour  and  power: 
because  thou  hast  created  all  things,  and  for  thy  will 
they  were,  and  have  been  created."  (Apoc.  iv.  ii.) 
And  being  worthy  of  this  glory,  He  wills  to  have  it, 
and  does  most  strictly  exact  it,  for  which  reason  He 
is  called  in  the  Scripture  a  jealous  God.  So  those 
who  reflect  some  sparkle  of  God's  Majesty,  and 
under  some  aspect  repre^sent  His  person  upon  the 
earth,  as  do  princes,  lay  and  ecclesiastical,  have 
many  observances  of  honour  and  respect  paid  to 
them,  which  are  not  meful  as  supplying  a  need — for 
who  needs  a  salute  of  twenty-one  guns  ?  neverthe- 
less their  dignity  is  worthy  of  them,  and  they  require 
them  accordingly. 

8.  What  man  feels  strongly,  he  expresses  in 
word  and  action.  What  all  men  feel  strongly,  they 
express  by  meeting  together  for  the  purpose.  So 
that,  if  strong  religious  feeling  is  an  element  in 
every  good  and  reasonable   man's  character,  it  is 


WORSHIP  OF  GOD.  ly/ 

bound  to  find  expression,  and  that  a  social  expres- 
sion. Men  must  worship  together  according  to 
some  external  form  and  ritual.  God  may  reveal 
what  He  wills  that  ritual  to  be.  In  fact  He  did 
give  such  a  revelation  -and  prescription  to  the  Jews. 
To  Christians  He  has  spoken  in  His  Son,  and  still 
speaks  in  His  Church.  Any  other  than  the  one 
sacrifice  that  He  has  instituted,  or  any  other  public 
religious  ritual  than  is  approved  by  the  religious 
authority  which  He  has  established,  is  to  Him  of 
itself,  and  apart  from  the  invincibly  erroneous 
devotion  of  them  that  pay  it,  an  abomination :  for 
He  has  "  not  chosen  it."  Still  we  cannot  say  that, 
in  every  possible  state  of  things,  God  is  bound  to 
reveal  the  ritual  that  He  desires,  or  is  bound  Himself 
to  designate  the  authority  that  shall  fix  the  ritual 
which  alone  He  will  accept  and  allow  of.  If  the 
will  of  God  is  not  thus  expressed,  a  ritual  must  still 
be  drawn  up.  In  a  matter  that  excites  the  mind,  as 
religion  does,  and  where  a  large  field  is  open  for 
hallucination  and  eccentricity,  it  will  not  do  to  have 
individuals  parading  methods  of  worship  of  their 
own  invention.  Here  the  Greek  maxim  comes  in, 
TLfia  TO  Saifxoviop  Kara  ra  Trdrpia,  "  honour  the 
D^ity  after  the  fashion  of  thy  country."  Rehgious 
authorities  must  be  set  up,  in  the  same  way  that 
the  civil  power  is  set  up.  These  authorities  will 
determine,  not  the  object,  but  the  outward  manner  of 
worship.  Every  great  nation,  or  important  member 
of  the  human  family,  would  come  probably  to  have 
its  own  characteristic  rite ;  and  within  each  rite 
there  would  be  local  varieties. 


igS  OF  DUTIES  TO   GOD. 

Readings. — St.  Thos.,  Contra  Gentiles,  iii.,   iig  >' 
2a   2ae,   q.   8i,   art.  4,   in   corp. ;    ib.,  q.  81,  art.  7 
ih.,  q.  84,  art.  2:  ^"i.,  q.  85,  art.  i,  in   Corp.,  ad  i,  3; 
ib.,  q.  91. 

Section  II. — Of  Superstitious  Practices. 

1.  Superstition  is  the  abuse  of  religion.  It  is 
superstition,  either  to  worship  false  gods,  or  to 
worship  the  true  God  with  unauthorized  rites,  or 
to  have  deahngs  with  wicked  spirits,  whether  those 
spirits  have  once  animated  human  bodies  or  not. 
Of  the  first  head,  the  only  avowed  instance  within 
our  civilization  is  the  Positivist  worship  of  the 
Great  Being,  that  is,  of  the  collective  Worthies  of 
Humanity,  if  indeed  it  amounts  to  worship.  The 
second  head  might  have  been  meditated  by  Arch- 
bishop Cranmer  with  advantage,  when  he  was 
drawing  up  the  Edwardine  Ordinal.  Under  the 
third  head  comes  Spiritualism,  which  we  shall 
here  not  discuss  in  detail,  but  merely  indicate  certain 
principles  upon  which  it  must  be  judged. 

2.  "There  is  nothing  superstitious  or  unlawful 
in  simply  applying  natural  agencies  to  the  produc- 
tion of  certain  effects,  of  which  they  are  supposed 
to  be  naturally  capable.  .  .  .  We  must  consider 
whether  there  is  a  fair  appearance  of  the  cause 
being  able  to  produce  the  effect  naturally.  If  there 
is,  the  experiment  will  not  be  unlawful :  for  it  is 
lawful  to  use  natural  causes  in  order  to  their  proper 
effects."  (2a  2se,  q.  96,  art.  2,  in  corp.,  ad  i.)  But 
this  we  must  understand  under  two  provisos.  First, 
that  the  "fair  appearance"  spoken  of  be  not  opposed 


SUPERSTITIOUS  PRACTICES.  19$ 


by  a  considerable  force  of  evidence,  whether  of 
authority  or  of  reason,  tending  the  other  way :  for 
in  this  matter,  which  is  not  a  mere  matter  of 
legahty,  it  is  not  permissible  to  run  risks  of  becom- 
ing familiar  with  God's  enemies.  Secondly,  that 
the  cause,  though  natural,  be  not  morally  prejudicial. 
Not  even  a  natural  cause,  brandy  for  instance,  may 
be  used  to  all  its  effects.  Thus  for  the  mesmeric 
sleep,  though  that  should  be  proved  to  be  purely 
natural,  yet  the  weakening  of  the  will  thence  ensu- 
ing, and  the  almost  irresistible  dominion  acquired 
by  the  operator  over  his  patient,  render  it  imperative 
that  such  a  remedy  should  not  be  applied  without 
grave  necessity,  and  under  an  operator*  of  assured 
moral  character. 

3.  St.  Thomas  continues  in  the  place  last  quoted  : 
"Wherefore,  if  there  is  no  fair  appearance  of 
the  causes  employed  being  able  to  produce  such 
effects,  it  needs  must  be  that  they  are  not  employed 
to  the  causation  of  these  effects  as  causes,  but  only 
as  signs,  and  thus  they  come  under  the  cate- 
gory of  preconcerted  signals  arranged  with  evil 
spirits." 

The  modern  Spiritualist  is  only  too  forward  to 
avow  his  understanding  with  the  unseen  powers ; 
but  he  will  have  it  that  the  spirits  that  he  deals 
with  are  good  and  harmless.  We  must  prove  the 
spirits  by  the  general  effects  of  their  communica- 
tions— whether  they  be  in  accordance  with  the 
known  laws  of  morality,  and  the  assured  teach- 
ings of  religion,  natural  and  revealed.  Also  we 
must  consicicT,  from  what  we  know  from  approved 


ioo  OF  DUTIES   TO   GOD. 


sources  concerning  God,  and  His  holy  angels,  and 
the  spirits  of  the  just,  either  already  made  perfect, 
or  still  suffering  for  a  time,  whether  they  are  likely 
to  respond  to  such  signs  as  Spiritualists  commonly 
employ.  Also  we  must  not  ignore,  what  revelation 
tells  us,  of  an  "  enemy,"  a  *'  father  of  lies,"  who 
"  changes  himself  into  an  angel  of  light,"  and  who 
is  ever  ready,  so  far  as  it  is  permitted  liim,  to  eke 
out  curiosity,  folly,  and  credulity,  such  as  he  found 
in  Eve. 

Readings. — St.  Thos.,  2a  2se,  q.  93 ;  ih.,  q.  95, 
art.  4,  in  corp. 


Section  III. — Of  the  duty  ofhwwing  God, 

I.  Religious  worship  is  bound  to  its  object,  and 
cannot  possibly  be  fixed  in  the  hearts  of  men  and 
the  institutions  of  society,  if  the  object  be  doubtful 
and  fluctuating.  False  religion  has  often  been  set 
off  with  elaborate  and  gorgeous  ceremonial,  which 
has  been  kept  up  even  after  the  performers  had 
come  to  see  in  all  that  light  and  lustre  a  mere  vain 
and  unsubstantial  show.  Such  were  the  rites  of 
Roman  polytheism,  as  enacted  by  augurs  and 
pontiffs,  the  colleagues  of  Cicero  and  Csesar.  But 
though  that  worship  was  maintained,  and  even 
augmented,  for  political  purposes,  v/ithout  a  creed, 
yet  never  could  it  have  arisen  without  some  creed, 
however  mistaken,  earnestly  held  of  old.  A  firm 
interior  conviction  is  the  starting-point  of  all 
outward  worship.  But  if  the  modern  living  wor- 
shipper is  without  creed  and  conviction;  if  he  be 


DUTY   01'    KNOWING   GOD.  aOi 


a  scoffer  at  heart,  or  at  least  a  doubter;  what  a 
hollow,  horrid  skeleton  thin-,'  is  his  religion, — all 
the  more  horrid,  the  grander  its  dress !  That  is  not 
worship,  but  mummery. 

2.  If  then  to  w^orship  God  is  a  duty,  as  we  have 
proved,  it  is  a  duty  likewise  to  know  God.  This 
supposes  that  God  is  knowable,  a  fact  which  it  does 
not  lie  within  the  province  of  this  work  to  prove. 
To  an  unknown  God,  all  the  worship  we  could 
render  would  be  to  build  Him  an  altar,  without 
priest,  prayer,  or  sacrifice,  and  so  leave  Him  in  His 
solitude.  God  is  knowable  by  the  mamfestation  of 
His  works  (Rom.  i.  19) ;  and  where  He  is  pleased 
to  speak,  by  the  revelation  of  His  word.  Apart  from 
revelation — and,  under  a  certain  order  of  Providence, 
God  might  have  left  us  without  revelation — we 
should  study  our  Creator  as  He  is  made  manifest  in 
the  world  around  us,  in  the  existence  of  perishable 
things,  in  the  order  of  the  universe,  in  the  region  of 
things  eternally  possible  and  knowable,  in  moral 
truths,  in  the  mental  life  and  conscience  of  man. 
Philosophy  would  be  our  guide  in  the  search  after 
God.  Men  with  less  leisure  or  abihty  for  specula- 
tion would  acquiesce  in  the  pronouncements  of 
philosophers  on  things  divine ;  and,  in  the  hypo- 
thesis which  we  are  contemplating.  Providence 
would  doubtless  arrange  for  the  better  agreement 
and  harmony  of  philosophers  among  themselves. 
Their  trumpet  would  not  send  forth  so  uncertain  a 
blast,  were  that  the  instrument,  in  the  counsels  of 
God,  whereby  the  whole  duty  of  religion  was  to  be 
regulated.      As    it  is,  we    know   better  than   philo- 


2oa  OF  THE  DUTY  OF  PRESERVING   LIFE. 

sophy  could  teach  us :  for  God  hath  spoken  in  His 
Son. 

Readings, — C.  Gejit.,  i.,  4  ;  la  2ae,  q.  91,  art.  4,  in 
Corp. 


CHAPTER   II. 

OF   THE    DUTY   OF    PRESERVING    LIFE. 

Section  I. — Of  Killing,  Direct  and  Indirect. 

I.  In  a  hilly  country,  two  or  three  steps  sometimes 
measure  all  the  interval  between  the  basins  of  two 
rivers,  whose  mouths  are  miles  apart.  In  the  crisis 
of  an  illness  the  merest  trifle  will  turn  the  scale 
between  death  and  recovery.  In  a  nice  point  of  law 
and  intricate  procedure,  the  lawyer  is  aware  that 
scarcely  more  than  the  thickness  of  the  paper  on 
which  he  writes  lies  between  the  case  going  for  his 
client  or  for  the  opposite  party.  To  rail  at  these 
fine  technicalities  argues  a  lay  mind,  unprofessional 
and  undiscerning.  Hair-splitting,  so  far  as  it  is  a 
term  of  real  reproach,  means  splitting  the  wrong 
hairs.  The  expert  in  any  profession  knows  what 
things  to  divide  and  distinguish  finely,  and  what 
things  to  take  in  the  gross.  Moral  Science  in  many 
respects  gives  its  demonstrations,  and  can  give  them, 
only  "  in  the  way  of  rough  drawing,"  as  Aristotle 
says.  {'Trax'okoi'i  /cal  tvttu),  Ethics,  I.,  iii.,  4.)  But  there 
are  lines  of  division  exceeding  fine  and  nice  in 
natural  morality  no  less  than  in  positive  law.  The 
student  must  not  take  scandal  at  the  fine  lines  and 


KILLING.   DIRECT   AND   INDIRECT.  20J 

subtle  distinctions  that  we  shall  be  obliged  to  draw 
in  marking  off  lawful  from  unlawful  action  touching 
human  life. 

2.  It  is  never  lawful  directly  to  kill  an  innocent  man. 
Understand  innocent  in  the  social  and  political  sense, 
of  a  man  who  has  not,  by  any  Jiunian  act  {Ethics,  c.  i., 
n.  2,  p.  i)  of  his  own,  done  any  harm  to  society  so 
grievous  as  to  compare  with  loss  of  life.  To  kill,  or 
work  any  other  effect,  directly,  is  to  bring  about  that 
death,  or  other  effect,  willing  the  same,  either  as  an 
end  desirable  in  itself,  as  when  a  man  slays  his  enemy,^ 
whose  death  of  its  own  sheer  sake  is  to  him  a  satis- 
faction and  a  joy,  or  as  a  means  to  an  end,  as  Richard 
III.  murdered  his  nephews  to  open  his  own  way  to 
the  throne.  We  must  then  in  no  case  compass  the 
death  of  the  innocent,  either  intending  it  as  an  ejid, 
or  choosing  it  as  a  means.  The  assertion  is  proved 
by  these  considerations.  To  kill  a  man  is  to  destroy 
the  human  nature  within  him :  for,  though  the  soul 
survives,  he  is  man  no  more  when  he  is  dead.  Now 
to  destroy  a  thing  is  to  subordinate  that  thing  entirely 
to  your  self  and  your  own  purposes :  for  that  indi- 
vidual thing  can  never  serve  any  other  purpose,  once 
it  is  destroyed.  The  man  that  is  killed  is  then  sub- 
ordinated to  the  slayer,  wholly  given  up,  and  as  we 
say,  sacrificed,  to  the  aims  and  purposes  of  him  who 
slays  him.  But  that  ought  not  to  be,  for  man  is  a 
person.  Body  and  soul  in  him  make  one  person,  one 
personal  nature,  which  human  personality  is  destroyed 
in  death.  Now  it  is  the  property  of  a  person  to  be 
what  we  may  call  autocentric,  referring  its  own  opera- 
tions to  itself  as  to  a  centre.      Every  person — and 


204  OF   THE  DUTY   OF  PRESERVING   LIFE. 


every  intelligent  nature  is  a  person* — exists  and  acts 
primarily  for  himself.  A  thing  is  marked  off  from  a 
person  by  the  aptitude  of  being  another's  and  for 
another.  We  may  venture  to  designate  it  by  the 
term  heterocentric.  A  person  therefore  may  destroy 
a  thing,  entirely  consume  and  use  it  up  for  his  own 
benefit.  But  he  may  not  treat  a  person  as  a  thing, 
and  destroy  that,  either  for  any  end  of  pleasure  that 
he  finds  in  destroying  it,  or  in  view  of  any  gain  or 
good,  whereunto  that  destruction  serves  him  as  a 
means. 

3.  In  the  above  argumentation  account  has  not 
been  taken  of  God,  to  whom  for  His  sovereign 
dominion  all  created  personalities  stand  in  the  light 
of  things,  and  may  be  destroyed  at  His  pleasure. 
But  account  has  been  taken  of  the  State,  to  which 
the  individual  is  subordinate  as  a  citizen,  but  not  as 
a  man  and  a  person.  It  is  permitted  no  more  to 
the  State  than  to  the  individual  ever  to  destroy  the 
innocent  directly. 

4.  An  effect  is  brought  about  indirectly,  when  it 
is  neither  intended  as  an  end  for  its  own  sake,  noi 
chosen  as  a  means  making  towards  an  end,  but 
attaches  as  a  circumstance  concomitant  either  to 
the  end  intended  or  to  the  means  chosen.  The  case 
of  a  circumstance  so  attaching  to  the  means  chosen 
is  the  only  case  that  we  need  consider  here  in  speak- 
ing of  indirect,  concomitant,  or  incidental  effects.  The 
study  of  these  incidents  is  of  vast  importance  to  the 
moralist.  Most  cases  of  practical  difficulty  to  decide 
between  right  and  wrong,  arise  out  of  them.     They 

•  The  exception  apparent  in  the  Incarnation  is  not  relevant  hero. 


KILLING,   DIRECT  AND   INDIRECT.  ao3 

are  best  illustrated  in  the  manner  of  killing.  That  one 
matter,  well  worked  out,  becomes  a  pattern  for  other 
matters  in  which  they  occur.  {Ethics,  c.  iii.,  s.  ii.,  p.  31.) 

5.  A  man  is  killed  indirectly,  or  incidentally,  when 
he  perishes  in  consequence  of  certain  means  em- 
ployed towards  a  certain  end,  without  his  death 
being  willed  by  the  employer  of  those  means,  or  in 
any  way  serving  that  agent  to  the  furtherance  of  the 
end  that  he  has  in  view.  If  a  visitor  to  a  quarry 
were  standing  on  a  piece  of  rock,  which  a  quarryman 
had  occasion  to  blast,  and  the  man  fired  the  train 
regardless  of  the  visitor,  the  latter  would  be  in- 
cidentally killed.  Now  incidental  killing,  even  of  the 
innocent,  is  not  under  all  circumstances  unlawful. 
Where  the  end  in  view  is  in  the  highest  degree  im- 
portant, the  means  may  be  taken  thereto,  provided 
always  that  such  an  issue  as  the  shedding  of  innocent 
blood  be  not  itself  the  means  discerned  and  elected  as 
furthering  the  end  :  for  no  end  however  urgent  can 
justify  the  employment  of  any  evil  means.  (E^/iics,c.  iii., 
s.  ii.,  nn.  3,  13,  pp.  32,  36.)  Suppose  in  the  instance 
just  given  the  quarryman  saw  that,  unless  that  piece  of 
rock  where  the  visitor  stood  were  blown  up  instantly, 
a  catastrophe  would  happen  elsewhere,  which  would 
be  the  death  of  many  men,  and  there  were  no  time 
to  warn  the  visitor  to  clear  off,  who  could  blame  him 
if  he  applied  the  explosive?  The  means  of  averting 
the  catastrophe  would  be,  not  that  visitor's  death, 
but  the  blowing  up  of  the  rock.  The  presence  or 
absence  of  the  visitor,  his  death  or  escape,  is  all  one 
to  the  end  intended  :  it  has  no  bearing  thereon  at  all. 

6.  We  must  then  distinguish  between  means  and 


2o6  OF   THE   DUTY  OF  PRESERVING   LIFE. 

circumstances.  The  means  help  to  the  end,  the  cir- 
cumstances  of  the  means  do  not.  When  the  end  is 
of  extreme  urgency,  circumstances  may  be  disre- 
garded :  the  means  become  morally  divested  of  them. 
So  I  have  seen  an  island  in  a  river,  a  nucleus  of  rock 
with  an  environment  of  alluvial  soil.  While  the 
stream  v^^as  flowing  placidly  in  its  usual  course,  the 
island  remained  intact,  both  rock  and  earth.  But 
when  the  water  came  rushing  in  a  flood,  which  was 
as  though  the  island  itself  had  gone  speeding  up  the 
river,  the  loose  matter  at  its  sides  was  carried  away, 
and  only  the  central  rock  remained.  The  ordinary 
flow  of  the  river  past  the  island,  or  the  gentle  motion 
of  the  island  up-stream,  keeping  all  its  bulk,  repre- 
sents a  man  acting  for  an  end  to  which  reason 
attaches  no  great  importance.  He  must  then  take 
a  diligent  review  of  all  the  circumstances  that  have 
any  close  connection  with  his  action,  to  see  if  there 
is  any  that  it  would  be  wrong  for  him  to  will  directly. 
And  if  there  is,  he  must  abstain  from  willing  it  even 
indirectly :  that  is,  he  must  abstain  from  doing  the 
action,  which  cannot  be  done  without  that  objection- 
able circumstance  attending  it.  On  the  other  hand, 
the  floating  island  being  towed  rapidly  up-stream, 
with  its  loose  sides  falling  away,  portrays  the  con- 
dition of  one  acting  for  a  purpose  of  imperative 
urgency :  he  considers  the  means  to  that  end,  and 
if  they  are  good,  he  concentrates  his  will  upon  them 
and  uses  them,  disregarding,  or  even  deploring,  but 
nowise  walling  or  being  responsible  for,  the  evil  con- 
comitants which  go  with  those  means,  but  do  not 
make  for  his  end.     Thus  it  is,  that  a  circumstance 


KILLING,  DIRECT  AND   INDIRECT.  tofj 

which  in  ordinary  cases  goes  to  make  the  adoption 
of  certain  means  reasonable  or  unreasonable,  comes, 
in  a  case  of  great  urgency,  to  weigh  for  nothing  in 
the  balance  of  reason,  owing  to  the  extreme  and 
crying  reasonableness  of  the  end  in  view.  Nor  is 
this  the  end  justifying  the  means,  for  that  unhappy 
circumstance  is  never  a  means  to  the  end.  {Ethics^ 
c.  iii.,  s.  ii.,  n.  8,  p.  34.) 

7.  To  illustrate  by  a  diagram : 
C 


o 


u 


O^ 


A  E^ 

A,  the  agent,  a  bead  on  a  wire,  can  move  only  on 
the  line  A  E,  that  alone  being  the  line  of  means  to 
the  end. 

E  V,  reasonableness  of  end  in  view,  attracting  A. 

U  C,  the  amount  of  moral  evil  which  the  tdi- 
toward  circumstance  would  involve,  if  it  were  willed 
directly.  This  U  C  repels  A,  tending  to  jam  it  on 
the  line  A  E,  which  is  absolutely  rigid. 

A  E,  remoteness,  difficulty,  and  uncertainty  of 
the  end  in  view. 

A  U,  remoteness  of  untoward  circumstance  from 

means  chosen,  which  A  is  just  in  the  act  of  taking. 

Then,  for  lawful  action,  the  reasonableness  required 

in  the  end  in  view  is  represented  by  the  variation — 

_.,,         UC    .   AE 
EV   <^    —K\J  — 

We  observe  that  when  AU  is  zero,  while  UC  .  AE 
remains  a  finite  quantity  (representing  an  appre- 
ciable evil),  then   EV  becomes  infinite:    that  is  to 


zo8  OF   THE  DUTY   GF  PRESERVING   LIFE. 

say,  when  the  distance,  difference,  or  distinction 
between  the  evil  circumstance  and  the  means  comes 
down  to  nothing  at  all,  and  the  evil  thing  actually 
is  the  very  means  taken,  then  an  infinite  urgency  of 
end  in  view  would  be  requisite  to  justify  the  using 
of  that  means :  in  other  words,  no  end  possible  to 
man  can  ever  justify  an  evil  means. 

Readings. — St.Thos.,  2a  2se,  q.  64,  art.  6;  Cardinal 
de  Lugo,  De  Justitia  et  jure,  disp.  10,  n.  125. 

Section  II. — Of  Killing  done  Indirectly  in  Self-defence. 

I.  On  the  question,  whether  it  is  lawful  for  one 
man  to  kill  another  in  self-defence,  St.  Thomas 
writes  (2a  2as,  q.  64,  art.  7)  : 

"  There  is  nothing  to  hinder  one  act  having  two 
effects,  of  which  one  only  is  within  the  intention  [and 
election]  of  the  doer,  while  the  other  is  beside  his 
intention  [and  election,  that  is,  is  neither  intended  as 
an  end  nor  elected  as  a  means] ....  From  the  act 
therefore  of  one  defending  himself  a  twofold  effect 
may  follow,  one  the  preservation  of  his  own  life,  the 
other  the  killing  of  the  aggressor.  Now  such  an  act, 
in  so  far  as  the  preservation  of  the  doer's  own  life  is 
intended,  has  no  taint  of  evil  about  it,  seeing  that  it 
is  natural  to  everything  to  preserve  itself  in  being 
as  much  as  it  can.  Nevertheless,  an  act  coming  of 
a  good  intention  may  be  rendered  unlawful,  if  it  be 
not  in  proportion  to  the  end  in  view.  And  therefore, 
if  any  one  uses  greater  violence  than  is  necessary 
for  the  defence  of  his  life,  it  will  be  unlawful.  But  if 
he  repels  the  violence  in  a  moderate  way,  it  will  be 
a    lawful    defence  :  for   according  to  the  Civil  and 


KILLING   IN  SI:LF-DEFENCE.  log 

Canon  Laws  it  is  allowable  to  repel  force  by  force 
with  the  niodcraiioyi  of  a  blameless  defence.  Nor  is  it 
necessary  to  salvation  for  a  man  to  omit  the  act  of 
moderate  defence  in  order  to  avoid  the  killing  of 
another ;  because  man  is  more  bound  to  take  thought 
for  his  own  life  than  for  the  life  of  his  neighbour. 
But  because  to  kill  a  man  is  not  allowable  except  by 
act  of  public  authority  for  the  common  good,  it  is  un- 
lawful for  a  man  to  intend  [that  is,  elect  and  choose 
as  a  means]  to  kill  another  man  in  order  to  defend 
himself,  unless  he  be  one  who  has  public  authority, 
who  intending  [electing]  to  kill  a  man  in  order  to 
his  own  defence,  refers  this  to  the  public  good." 

2.  The  right  then  of  self-defence  even  to  the 
shedding  of  blood  involves  a  mere  exercise  of  indirect 
killing  for  a  proportionably  grave  cause.  The  cause 
in  question  is  the  defence  of  your  own  life,  or  your 
friend's,  or  of  some  other  good  or  possession  that  can 
weigh  with  life,  as  the  honour  and  inviolability  of 
your  person,  or  a  large  sum  of  money.  This  must 
be  in  present  danger  of  being  taken  away  otherwise 
than  in  due  course  of  justice.  The  danger  must  be 
present,  and  even  imminent,  not  prospective.  The 
right  of  self-delence  even  to  the  grievous  harming  of 
the  aggressor,  endures  only  while  the  danger  from 
him  is  imminent,  not  when  it  is  past,  or  the  evil  is 
already  done.  The  right  supposes  no  moral  ob- 
liquity, no  formal  injustice  on  the  part  of  the 
aggressor :  he  may  be  a  madman  making  for  you 
with  a  drawn  sword.  Nay  further,  not  even  material 
injustice — that  is,  the  quality  of  an  act  which  would 
be  formally  unjust,  if  only  the  agent  knew  what  he 
o 


aio  OF  THE   DUTY  OF  PRESERVING   LIFE. 


was  about — is  required.  All  that  is  requisite  is 
that  your  hfe,  or  something  equivalent  to  life,  be 
threatened,  not  in  due  course  of  law. 

3.  The  essential  idea  of  self-defence  is  that  of 
stopping  a  trespasser,  one  who,  however  innocently, 
is  going  about  to  trench  on  that  good  which  you  have 
a  right  to  maintain  and  reserve  to  yourself.  It  is 
then  no  act  of  authority  that  you  perform,  but  the 
dealing  of  one  private  person  with  another.  Indeed, 
the  party  stopped  is  hardly  regarded  as  a  person : 
no  account  is  taken  of  his  demerits :  he  is  regarded 
simply  as  an  abridger  and  diminisher  of  what  you 
have  a  right  to  preserve  intact.  You  stop  a  man  as 
you  stop  a  horse,  only  with  more  regard  to  the 
tjiodcratton  of  a  blameless  self-defence,  not  using  more 
violence  than  is  necessary  here  and  now  to  preserve 
what  you  have  to  preserve. 

4.  The  stopping,  unfortunately,  has  often  to  be 
done  in  a  hurry :  there  is  no  time  to  wait :  for  the 
next  moment,  unless  you  act  promptly,  it  will  be  all 
too  late,  or  all  to  no  purpose,  to  act  at  all.  Being 
done  in  a  hurry,  it  has  to  be  done  in  a  rough-and- 
ready  way,  with  such  instruments  as  are  to  hand : 
you  cannot  afford  to  be  nice  about  the  means,  care- 
fully purifying  them,  and  shaking  off  the  dust  of 
objectionable  circumstances.  Now  to  stop  a  man 
in  mid  career  all  on  a  sudden,  to  render  him  power- 
less where  he  was  about  to  strike,  motionless  in  the 
direction  whither  he  was  about  to  go,  and  that  in  an 
instant,  is  of  common  necessity  a  rude  treatment, 
very  dangerous  to  him  who  experiences  it,  and  under 
some    conceivable    circumstances    hopelessly   fatal. 


KILLING   IN   SELF-DEFENCE.  air 


Still  the  fatality — in  plain  words,  the  death  of  the 
aggressor — is  not  directly  irilled.  It  is  neither  in- 
tended as  an  end,  nor  chosen  as  a  means  to  an  end.  It 
is  not  welcomed  as  an  end  and  desirable  consumma- 
tion :  on  the  contrary,  it  is  put  up  with  most  re- 
luctantly as  coming  from  your  act :  for  you,  a  private 
individual,  have  no  right  to  will  and  effect  the  death 
of  any  man,  however  guilty,  as  will  be  proved  here- 
after. It  is  not  chosen  as  a  means :  for,  formally  as 
his  death,  it  is  no  means  to  your  end,  which  was  the 
averting  of  all  present  danger  to  your  right.  For 
that  it  was  enough  to  stop  the  trespasser ;  and  you 
chose  the  means  as  a  stopping  means,  not  as  a  killing 
means.  True,  in  stopping  him  you  killed  him,  but 
you  did  not  kill  him  to  stop  him.  You  struck  him 
to  stop  him  :  that  your  blow  was  a  mortal  blow,  was 
a  circumstance  which  you  did  not  choose  and  could 
not  help.  All  killing  then  in  self-defence  is  in- 
direct. 

5.  By  this  explanation,  resting  on  St.  Thomas — in 
opposition  to  Cardinal  de  Lugo  {De  Just,  et  Jure.  10, 
149)  and  others,  who  allow  kiUing  in  self-defence  to  be 
the  actual  means  chosen,  and  therefore  directly  willed 
— we  save  four  grand  positions  in  Moral  Science : 

(a)  The  axiom,  that  it  is  never  lawful  directly  to 
take  the  life  of  an  innocent  man.  For  the  person  who 
perishes  by  occasion  of  your  defending  yourself,  may 
be  innocent  formally,  and  even  materially  also. 

(6)  Likewise  the  axiom,  that  it  is  never  lawful  for 
a  private  individual  to  kill  any  one  whatever.  We  say, 
from  a  technical  standpoint,  that  he  does  not  kill 
but  arrests  the  onset  of  the  aggressor. 


212  GF  THE  DUTY  OF  PRESERVING   LIFE. 

(c)  We  are  in  hearty  accord  with  the  positive  law 
of  all  civilized  countries,  which  views  with  extreme 
suspicion  all  deaths  said  to  be  done  in  self-defence, 
the  law  being  jealous  of  the  blood  of  its  citizens,  and 
reserving  the  shedding  thereof  to  itself.  We  teach 
that  only  by  process  of  law  can  a  man  ever  be 
directly  slain,  his  death  made  a  means  of,  and  the 
person,  who  strikes  him,  really  willing  and  seeking, 
exactly  speaking,  to  kill  him. 

(d)  The  initial  error  is  revealed  of  a  theory  that 
we  shall  have  to  combat  at  length  hereafter,  the 
theory  of  Hobbes  and  Locke,  that  the  power  of  the 
State  is  the  mere  agglomeration  of  the  powers  of 
the  individuals  who  compose  it.  It  appears  by 
our  explanation  that  the  individual  has  no  power 
strictly  to  take  life  in  any  case,  or  ever  to  kill 
directly,  as  the  State  does  when  it  executes  a 
criminal. 

As  a  fifth  point  gained,  we  may  mention  the 
efficacious  argument  afforded,  as  will  presently  be 
shown,  against  the  acceptance  of  a  duel  under  any 
conceivable  circumstances,  a  thesis  otherwise  not 
easy  to  establish  by  reason. 

6.  In  view  of  the  question  of  the  origin  of  civil 
government,  we  must  carefully  collect  the  differences 
between  self-defence  and  punishment.  Death  occa- 
sioned in  self-defence  is  indirect :  death  inflicted  as 
punishment  is  direct.  Punishment  is  an  act  ol 
authority,  of  distributive  justice,  which  lies  from  ruler 
to  subject  {Ethics,  c.  v.,  s.  ix.,  n.  4,  p. 104) :  self-defence 
i:  of  equal  against  equal.  Punishment  is  medicinal  to 
him  who  suffers  it,  or  deterrent  on  behalf  of  the  com- 


Ob-  SUICIDE.  213 


munity,  or  retributive  in  the  way  of  vengeance. 
{Ethics,  c.  ix.,  s.  iii.,  n.  4.)  Self-defence  is  not  on 
behalf  of  the  community,  still  less  for  the  good  of 
the  aggressor,  but  for  the  good  of  him  who  practises 
it  and  for  the  preservation  of  his  right :  neither  is  it 
retributive  and  retrospective,  as  vengeance  is,  but 
simply  prospective  and  preventive  of  a  harm  imme- 
diately imminent.  Finally,  the  right  to  punish 
abides  day  and  night :  but  the  right  of  self-defence 
holds  only  while  instant  aggression  is  threatened. 

7.  These  two  diverse  ideas  of  self-defence  and 
vengeance  were  confounded  by  the  Greeks  under  the 
one  verb  u/xvi/eadai.  They  are  confounded  by  Mill,  On 
Utility,  in  the  fifth  chapter  where  he  speaks  (p.  77) 
of  the  "  instinct  of  self-defence,"  which  nine  lines 
below  he  converts  into  "the  natural  feeling  of  retali- 
ation or  vengeance."  It  is  a  common  but  a  grave 
mistake,  and  the  parent  of  much  bad  philosophy. 

Readings. — St.  Thos.,  2a  2as,  q.  64,  art.  7. 

Section  III. — Of  Suicide. 

I.  By  suicide  we  shall  here  understand  the  direct 
compassing  of  one's  own  death,  which  is  an  act  never 
lawful.  There  is  no  difficulty  in  seeing  the  unlawful- 
ness of  suicide  for  ordinary  cases.  The  world  could 
not  go  on,  if  men  were  to  kill  themselves  upon  every 
slight  disappointment.  But  neither  are  they  likely 
so  to  do.  It  is  the  hard  cases,  where  men  are  apt 
to  lay  violent  hands  on  themselves,  that  put  the 
moralist  on  his  mettle  to  restrain  them  by  reasons. 
Why  should  not  the  solitary  invalid  destroy  himself, 
he  whose  life  has  become  a  hopeless  torture,  and 


214  OF   THE  DUTY   OF  PRESERVING   LIFE. 

whose  death  none  would  mourn  ?  Why  should  not 
a  voluntary  death  be  sought  as  an  escape  from  temp- 
tation and  from  imminent  sin  ?  Why  should  not  the 
first  victims  of  a  dire  contagion  acquiesce  in  being 
slaughtered  like  cattle  ?  Or  if  it  be  deemed  perilous 
to  commit  the  departure  from  life  to  each  one's 
private  whim  and  fancy,  why  not  have  the  thing 
licensed  under  certificate  of  three  clerg}'men  and 
four  doctors,  who  could  testify  that  it  is  done  on 
good  grounds  ? 

2.  To  all  these  questions  there  is  one  good  answer 
returned  by  Paley  on  the  principle  of  General  Con- 
sequences. {Ethics,  c.  X.,  n.  3,  p.  178.) 

"  The  true  question  of  this  argument  is  no  other 
than  this :  May  every  man  who  chooses  to  destroy 
his  life,  innocently  do  so  ?  Limit  and  distinguish 
the  subject  as  you  can,  it  will  come  at  last  to  this 
question.  For,  shall  we  say  that  we  are  then  at 
liberty  to  commit  suicide,  when  we  find  our  con- 
tinuance in  life  becomes  useless  to  mankind  ?  Any 
one  who  pleases,  may  make  himself  useless ;  and 
melancholy  minds  are  prone  to  think  themselves 
useless  when  they  really  are  not  so.  .  .  .  In  like 
manner,  whatever  other  rule  you  assign,  it  will  ulti- 
mately bring  us  to  an  indiscriminate  toleration  of 
suicide,  in  all  cases  in  which  there  is  danger  of  its 
being  committed.  It  remains,  therefore,  to  enquire 
what  would  be  the  effect  of  such  a  toleration :  evi- 
dently, the  loss  of  many  lives  to  the  community,  of 
which  some  might  be  useful  or  important ;  the  afflic- 
tion of  many  families,  and  the  consternation  of  all : 
for  mankind  must  live  in  continual  alarm  for  the  fate 


OF  SUICIDE.  «»S 


of  their  friends,  when  every  disgust  which  is  power- 
ful enough  to  tempt  men  to  suicide,  shall  be  deemed 
sufficient  to  justify  it."  {Moral  Philosophy,  bk.  iv., 
c.  iii.) 

A  word  in  confirmation  of  Paley  on  the  plan  of 
the  medico-clerical  certificate.  There  would  be 
doctors/  and  I  fear  clergymen  too,  who  would  get  a 
name  for  giving  these  certificates  easily :  under  their 
hand  many  a  patient  might  be  smothered  by  his 
attendants  with  or  without  his  own  consent.  Many 
another  wretch  would  consider,  that  if  the  learned 
and  reverend  gentlemen  empowered  to  license  his 
departure  from  life  only  felt  what  he  had  to  endure, 
there  would  be  no  difficulty  about  the  certificate :  so 
he  would  depart  on  presumed  leave.  The  whole 
effect  would  be  to  make  men  less  tender  of  their 
own  lives,  and  by  consequence  of  those  of  others,  to 
the  vast  unsettling  of  society. 

3.  An  argument  from  general  consequences,  how- 
ever, does  not  go  down  into  the  depths  of  things. 
There  is  always  something  morally  crooked  and  in- 
ordinate in  an  action  itself,  the  general  consequences 
whereof  are  bad.  It  remains  to  point  out  the  moral 
crookedness,  inordination,  and  unreasonableness, 
that  is  intrinsic  to  the  act  of  suicide,  apart  from  its 
consequences.  We  find  the  inordination  in  this, 
that  suicide  is  an  act  falling  upon  undue  matter, 
being  an  act  destructive  of  that  which  the  agent  has 
power  over  only  to  preserve.  It  is  natural  to  every 
being,  animate  and  inanimate,  to  the  full  extent  of  its 
entity  and  power,  to  maintain  itself,  and  to  resist 
destruction  as  long  as  it  can.     This  is  the  struggle 


Ij^     U.O       11     ^U.11.  illlO       lO       m^       OLlWjjj^l 


2i6  OF   THE    DUTY   OF  PRESERVING   LIFE. 


for  existence,  one  of  the  primary  laws  of  nature. 
Man  has  inteUigcnce  and  power  over  himself,  that 
he  may  conduct  his  own  struggle  well  and  wisely. 
He  may  struggle  more  or  less,  as  he  sees  expedient, 
looking  to  higher  goods  even  than  self-preservation 
in  this  mortal  life :  but  he  may  not  take  that  power 
of  managing  himself,  which  nature  invests  him  with 
for  his  preservation,  and  use  it  to  his  own  destruc- 
tion. Should  he  do  so,  he  perverts  the  natural  order 
of  his  own  being,  and  thereby  sins.  {Ethics,  c.  vi.,  s.  i., 
nn,  I — 5,  p.  log.) 

4.  It  may  be  objected,  that  man  is  only  bound 
to  self-preservation  so  long  as  life  is  a  blessing ;  that, 
when  the  scale  of  death  far  outweighs  that  of  life  in 
desirableness,  it  is  cruelty  to  himself  to  preserve  his 
life  any  longer,  and  a  kindness  to  himself  to  destroy 
it ;  that  in  such  a  plight,  accordingly,  it  is  not  un- 
natural for  a  man  to  put  himself,  not  so  much  out 
of  life  as  out  of  misery.  To  this  argument  it  is 
sometimes  answered  that,  whereas  death  is  the 
greatest  of  evils,  it  is  foolish  and  wicked  to  resort  to 
dying  as  a  refuge  against  any  other  calamity.  But 
this  answer  proves  too  much.  It  would  show  that 
it  is  never  lawful  even  to  wish  for  death :  whereas 
under  many  conditions,  such  as  those  now  under 
consideration,  death  is  a  consummation  devoutly  to 
be  wished,  and  may  be  most  piously  desired,  as  a 
gain  and  by  comparison  a  good :  as  Ecclesiasticus 
says  (xxx.  17) :  "  Better  is  death  than  a  bitter  life, 
and  everlasting  rest  than  continual  sickness."  The 
truth  seems  to  be,  that  there  are  many  things  highly 
good  and  desirable  in  themselves,  which  become  evil 


OF  SUICIDE.  tij 


when  compassed  in  a  particular  way.  The  death  of 
a  great  tyrant  or  persecutor  may  be  a  blessing  to  the 
universe,  but  his  death  by  the  liand  of  an  assassin 
is  an  intolerable  evil.  So  is  death,  as  the  schoolmen 
say,  in  facto  esse,  and  everlasting  rest,  better  than  a 
bitter  life,  but  not  death  in  fieri,  when  that  means 
dying  by  your  own  hand.  There  the  unnaturalness 
comes  in  and  the  irrationality.  A  mother,  watching 
the  death  agony  of  her  son,  may  piously  wish  it  over  : 
but  it  were  an  unmotherly  act  to  lay  her  own  hand 
on  his  mouth  and  smother  him.  To  lay  violent 
hands  on  oneself  is  abidingly  cruel  and  unnatural, 
more  so  than  if  the  suicide's  own  mother  slew  him. 

5.  But  though  a  man  may  not  use  actual  violence 
against  his  own  person,  may  he  not  perhaps  cease 
to  preserve  himself,  abstain  from  food,  as  the  Roman 
noble  did,  in  the  tortures  of  the  gout,  and  by 
abstaining  end  them  ?  I  answer,  a  man's  taking 
food  periodically  is  as  much  part  of  his  life  as  the 
coursing  of  the  blood  in  his  veins.  It  is  doing 
himself  no  less  violence  to  refuse  food  ready  to 
hand,  when  he  is  starving,  on  purpose  that  he  may 
starve,  than  to  open  a  vein  on  purpose  to  bleed  to 
death.  This,  when  the  food  is  readily  accessible : 
the  case  is  otherwise  when  it  is  not  procurable 
except  by  extraordinary  means. 

6.  Another  consideration.  To  destroy  a  thing 
is  the  exclusive  right  of  the  owner  and  master  of 
the  same.  If  therefore  man  is  his  own  master,  in 
the  sense  that  no  one  else  can  claim  dominion  over 
him,  may  he  not  accordingly  destroy  himself?  The 
metaphysician  will  point  out  that  master  denotes  a 


ai8  OF   THE   DUTY   OF  PRESERVING   LIFE. 

relation,  that  every  relation  has  two  terms,  that 
consequently  a  man  cannot  be  his  own  master  any 
more  than  he  can  be  his  own  father ;  and  that,  not 
owning  himself,  he  may  not  destroy  himself.  But, 
leaving  this  metaphysical  argument  for  what  it  is 
worth,  we  observe  that  man  has  a  Master,  Owner, 
Proprietor,  and  Sovereign  Lord,  God  Almighty.  To 
take  your  own  life  is  to  usurp  the  dominion  of  God. 
It  is  wronging  the  Lord  of  life  and  death.  But 
none  is  wronged  against  his  will :  God  is  willing 
that  murderers  should  be  hung,  may  He  not  also 
be  willing  that  men  in  misery  should  hang  them- 
selves ?  To  this  query  suffice  it  for  the  present 
to  reply,  that  God  governs  us  for  our  good  ;  and 
that  capital  punishment  makes  for  the  good  of  the 
community,  but  never  suicide,  (c.  viii.,  s.  viii.,  n.  7, 

P-  349-) 

7.  It   was   the    doctrine    of    Aristotle    and    the 

Greeks,  that  the  citizen  belongs  to  the  State,  and 
that  therefore  suicide  was  robbing  the  State  and 
doing  it  a  formal  injury.  But  no  modern  State 
takes  this  view  of  its  subjects.  No  modern  mind 
would  place  suicide  in  the  same  category  of  crime 
with  robbing  the  Exchequer. 

8.  The  great  deterrent  against  suicide,  in  cases 
where  misery  meets  with  recklessness,  is  the  thought, 

In  that  sleep  of  death  what  dreams  may  come ! — 

above  all,  the  fear  of  being  confronted  with  an  angry 
God.  Away  from  belief  in  God's  judgments  and  a 
future  state,  our  arguments  against  suicide  may  be 
good  logic,  but  they  make  poor  rhetoric  for  those 


OP  DUELLING.  tig 


who  need  them  most.  Men  are  wonderfully  imita- 
tive in  killing  themselves.  Once  the  practice  is 
come  in  vogue,  it  becomes  a  rage,  an  epidemic. 
Atheism  and  Materialism  form  the  best  nidus  for 
the  contagion  of  suicide.  It  is  a  shrewd  remark 
of  Madame  de  Stael :  "Though  there  are  crimes  of 
a  darker  hue  than  suicide,  yet  there  is  none  other 
by  which  man  seems  so  entirely  to  renounce  the 
protection  of  God." 

Readings. — Ar.,  Eth.,  III.,  vii.,  13;  ib.,  V.,  xi., 
nn.  I — 3;  St.Thos.,  2a  21E,  q.  64,  art.  5;  St.  Aug., 
De  Civitate  Dei,  i.,  cc.  26,  27 ;  Paley,  Mor.  Phil., 
bk.  iv.,  c.  iii. 

Section  IV. — Of  Duelling. 

1.  A  duel  may  be  defined :  A  meeting  of  two 
parties  by  private  agreement  to  fight  with  weapons 
in  themselves  deadly.  The  meeting  must  be  by 
agreement :  a  chance  meeting  of  Montagues  and 
Capulets,  where  the  parties  improvise  a  fight  on  the 
spot  is  not  a  duel.  The  agreement  must  be  private : 
anything  arranged  by  public  authority,  as  the  en- 
counter of  David  with  Gohath,  that  in  the  legend 
of  the  Horatii  and  Curiatii,  or  the  wager  of  battle 
in  the  Middle  Ages  is  not  a  duel.  It  is  enough  that 
the  weapons  be  in  themselves  deadly,  as  swords  or 
pistols,  though  there  be  an  express  stipulation  not 
to  kill:  but  a  pre-arranged  encounter  with  fists,  with 
foils  with  buttons  on,  or  even  perhaps  with  crab- 
sticks,  is  not  a  duel. 

2.  The  hard  case  in  duelling  is  the  case  of  him 
who    receives    the    challenge.      Let    us    make    the 


ido  OF   THE   DUTY   OF   PRESERVING    LIFE. 

case  as  hard  as  possible.  In  a  certain  army, 
every  challenge  sent  to  an  officer  is  reported  to 
a  Court  of  Honour.  If  the  Court  decide  that  it 
ought  to  be  accepted,  accept  the  officer  must,  or 
lose  his  commission  and  all  hope  of  military  dis- 
tinction. In  this  army,  say,  there  is  an  ofhcer  of 
high  promise  who  is  believed  to  object  to  duels 
on  conscientious  grounds.  An  enemy  pretends  to 
have  been  insulted,  and  challenges  him,  on  purpose 
to  see  him  refuse  and  have  to  go  down  into  the 
ranks,  his  career  spoilt.  The  Court  of  Honour 
rules  that  the  duel  must  come  off.  Of  this  very 
case,  Reiffenstuel,  a  canonist  of  repute,  about  the 
year  1700,  writes: 

**  The  answer  is,  .  ,  .  that  they  who  in  such  cases 
are  so  necessitated  and  constrained  to  offer,  or 
accept,  a  duel,  as  that  unless  they  offered,  or  accepted 
it,  they  would  be  held  cowardly,  craven,  mean,  and 
unfit  to  bear  office  in  the  army,  and  consequently 
would  be  deprived  of  the  office  that  they  actually 
enjoy,  and  support  themselves  and  their  family  by, 
or  would  for  ever  forfeit  all  hope  of  promotion, 
otherwise  their  due  and  desert, — these  I  say  in 
such  a  case  are  free  from  all  fault  and  penalty, 
whether  they  offer  or  accept  a  duel."  (In  lib.  v. 
decret.,  tit.  14,  nn.  30,  31.) 

The  author  protest^;  in  his  Preface  that  he 
wishes  his  opmiorrs  "  all  and  each  to  be  subject  to 
the  judgment,  censure,  and  correction  of  the  Holy 
Catholic  Church."  The  opinion  above  quoted  was 
condemned,  word  for  word  as  it  was  uttered,  by 
Pope  Benedict  XIV.  in   1752. 


U^    DUELLING.  221 


Now  for  Reiffenstuel's  reason.  "The  reason," 
he  says,  "  is,  because  in  such  a  case  as  is  supposed 
the  acceptance  and  offering  of  a  duel  is  an  absolutely 
rtecessary,  and  thereby  a  just  and  lawful,  defence  ol 
your  reputation,  or  goods  of  fortune,  and,  by  equiva- 
lence, even  of  your  life,  against  an  unjust  aggressor, 
who  we  suppose  does  you  an  injury,  and  thereby 
gives  you  no  choice  but  to  call  him  out,  or  calls 
you  out,  and  accordingly  assails  you  in  words,  &c. 
Hence,  as  for  the  needful  defence  of  reputation,  or 
of  goods  of  fortune  of  great  consequence,  it  is  law- 
ful, with  the  moderation  of  a  blameless  defence,  to 
kill  an  unjust  aggressor,  so  it  will  be  also  lawful  to 
offer  and  accept  a  duel,  and  therein  slay  the  other 
party."  Reiffenstuel  here  evidently  supposes  that 
killing  done  in  self-defence  is  direct.  Those  who 
agree  with  him  on  that  point,  proceed  to  draw  differ- 
ences between  self-defence  and  accepting  a  challenge. 
Of  course  the  two  are  not  the  same.  The  true 
difficulty  for  them  lies  in  making  out  how  the 
reasons  which  justify  self-defence  in  their  view  of  it, 
do  not  also  justify  the  acceptance  of  a  duel :  how,  ii 
I  may  make  another  man's  death  a  vican^  to  the 
preservation  of  my  vital  right,  I  may  not  as  well 
make  another  man's  risk  of  death  and  my  own, 
which  is  all  that  a  duel  amounts  to,  also  a  means, 
none  other  being  at  hand,  to  the  preserving  of  my 
no  less  vital  right.  This  grave  objection  docs  not 
touch  us.  We  have  denied  that  killing  in  self- 
defence  is  direct.  On  the  lines  of  that  denial  we 
meet  Reiffenstuel's  argument  simply  as  follows. 

3.  In  self-defence,  the  aggressor  is  slain  indirectly. 


sa2  OF  THE  DUTY  OF  PRESERVING   LIFE. 

In  a  duel,  not  indeed  the  death  itself,  or  mutual 
slaughter  of  the  combatants,  is  directly  willed,  but 
the  risk  of  mutual  slaughter  is  directly  willed.  But 
we  may  not  directly  will  the  risk  of  that  which  we 
may  not  directly  do.  And  the  combatants  may  not 
directly  do  themselves  or  one  another  to  death. 
Therefore  they  may  not  directly  risk  each  his  own 
and  his  antagonist's  life.  But  this  risk  is  of  the 
essence  of  a  duel.  Therefore  duelling  is  essentially 
unlawful. 

4.  Such  is  the  clenched  fist,  so  to  speak,  of  our 
argument.  Now  to  open  it  out,  and  prove  in  detail 
the  several  members.  In  self-defence,  neither  the 
death  of  the  aggressor  nor  the  risk  of  his  death 
is  directly  willed,  whereas  the  risk  of  death  is 
directly  willed  in  a  duel,  which  difference  entirely 
bars  the  argument  from  self-defence  to  duelling. 
For  a  duel  is  a  means  of  recovering  and  preserving 
honour,  which  is  effected  by  a  display  of  fortitude, 
which  again  consists  in  exposing  yourself  to  the 
risk  of  being  killed,  and,  as  part  of  the  bargain, 
of  killing  the  other  man.  The  risk  to  life  is  of 
the  essence  of  a  duel :  it  only  attains  its  end — 
of  establishing  a  man's  character  for  courage — by 
being  dangerous  to  life.  Fortitude  essentially  con- 
sists in  braving  death.  {Ethics,  c.  v.,  s.  viii.,  n.  i,  p.  94.) 
Deadly  weapons,  chosen  because  they  are  deadly 
and  involve  a  risk  of  life  in  fighting  with  such  arms, 
are  the  apt  and  express  means  for  showing  readi- 
ness to  brave  death.  If  the  weapons  were  not 
deadly,  there  would  be  no  point  in  the  duel.  As  a 
matter  of  fact,  where  our  definition  of  duel  is  ved- 


OF  DUELLING.  W3 


fied,  and  weapons  in  themselves  deadly  are  used, 
the  encounter  cannot  be  other  than  dangerous, 
especially  between  foes  and  where  the  blood  is  up. 
In  the  French  army,  where  the  regimental  fencing- 
master  stands  by,  sword  in  hand,  ready  to  parry 
any  too  dangerous  thrust,  serious  results  still  have 
occurred.  If  any  man  will  have  it  that  short  smooth- 
bore pistols  at  forty  paces  in  a  fog  are  not  to  be 
counted  dangerous  weapons,  all  we  can  say  is  that 
MM.  Gambetta  and  De  Fourton,  the  one  being 
nearly  blind,  and  the  other  having  lost  an  eye,  did 
not  fight  a  duel.  In  a  duel  then  the  danger  of 
being  killed  and  of  killing  is  directly  willed ;  it  is  the 
precise  means  chosen  to  the  end  in  view. 

5.  We  have  proved  already  that  it  is  not  lawful 
directly  to  procure  one's  own  death,  nor  the  death 
of  another  innocent  man.  If  any  one  contends  that 
his  antagonist  is  not  innocent,  not  even  in  a  political 
sense  (c.  ii.,  s.  i.,  n.  2,  p.  203),  we  must  here  assume 
against  him,  what  we  shall  afterwards  prove,  that 
the  guilty  are  not  to  be  directly  put  to  death  except 
by  public  authority.  But  what  we  may  not  directly 
bring  about,  we  may  not  directly  risk  the  occurrence 
of.  As  I  may  not  throw  myself  down  a  cliff,  so 
neither  may  I  walk  along  the  edge  precisely  for  the 
chance  of  a  fall.  I  may  often  walk  there  with  the 
chance  of  falling,  but  not  because  of  the  chance.  It 
will  be  said  that  the  English  love  of  fox-hunting 
and  Alpine  climbing  is  largely  owing  to  the  element 
of  danger  present  in  those  amusements.  But  it  is 
not  the  danger  pure  and  simple,  that  is  chosen  for 
amusement :     it     is    the    prospect    of    overcoming 


224  OF  SPEAKING   THE   TRUTH. 

danger  by  skill.  The  same  may  be  said  of  Blondin 
on  the  tight-rope  :  it  was  his  skill,  not  his  mere  risk, 
that  was  admired.  There  are  some  risks  that  nc 
skill  can  obviate,  as  those  of  Alpine  avalanches. 
We  may  face  a  mountain  slope  where  avalanches 
occur,  but  we  must  not  hang  about  there  because  of 
the  avalanches,  making  our  amusement  or  bravado 
of  the  chance  of  being  killed.  That  would  be 
willing  the  risk  of  death  directly,  as  it  is  willed  in 
duelling. 

Readings. — Paley,  Mor.  Phil.,  bk.  iii.,  p.  2,  c.  ix. ; 
St.  Thos.,  2a  2£e,  q.  72,  art.  3. 


CHAPTER   in. 

OF   SPEAKING   THE   TRUTH. 

Section  I. — Of  the  Definition  of  a  Lie. 

I.  "  Let  none  doubt,"  says  St.  Augustine,  "  that  he 
lies,  who  utters  what  is  false  for  the  purpose  of 
deceiving.  Wherefore  the  utterance  of  what  is  false 
with  a  will  to  deceive  is  unquestionably  a  lie."  The 
only  question  is,  whether  this  definition  does  not 
contain  more  than  is  necessary  to  the  thing  defined. 
The  objective  falseness  of  what  is  said  makes  dL  mate- 
rial falsehood  :  the  will  to  utter  what  is  false  makes 
a  formal  falsehood  {Ethics,  c.  iii.,  s.  ii.,  n.  7,  p.  ^^) : 
the  will  to  create  a  false  impression  regards,  not  the 
falsehood  itself,  but  the  effect  to  follow  from  it.  If 
a  person  says  what  is  not  true,  but  what  he  takes  to 


DEFINITION   OF  A    LIE.  ii$ 

be  the  truth,  he  tells  indeed  a  material  lie,  but  at 
the  same  time  he  puts  forth  no  Jmman  act  {Ethics, 
c.  i.,  n.  2,  p.  i)  of  lying.  If  on  the  other  hand  he 
says  what  he  believes  to  be  false,  though  it  turns  out 
true,  he  tells  a  formal  lie,  though  not  a  material 
one,  and  moreover,  he  does  a  human  act  of  lying. 
But  human  acts  are  the  subject-matter  of  morality. 
The  moralist  therefore  is  content  to  define  the 
formal  lie :  the  material  aspect  of  the  lie  is  irrelevant 
to  his  enquiry.  A  formal  lie  is  saying  what  one 
believes  not  to  be  true,  or  promising  what  one 
m tends  not  to  perform  :  briefly,  it  is  speaking  against 
one's  mind. 

2.  We  shall  show  presently  that  to  speak  against 
one's  mind  is  intrinsically,  necessarily,  and  always 
evil.  But  when  a  thing  is  thus  evil  in  itself,  there  is 
no  need  to  bring  into  the  definition  of  the  act,  from 
a  moral  point  of  view,  the  intention  with  which  it 
is  done.  There  is  no  use  in  prying  into  ends,  when 
the  means  taken  is  an  unlawful  means  for  any  end. 
If  a  person  blasphemes,  we  do  not  ask  why  he 
blasphemes :  the  intention  is  not  part  of  the  blas- 
phemy :  the  utterance  is  a  sin  by  itself.  But  if  a 
person  strikes,  we  ask  why  he  strikes,  to  heal  or  to 
slay,  in  self-defence  or  in  revenge.  So,  if  speaking 
against  one's  mind  is  a  thing  indifferent  and  colour- 
less in  point  of  morality,  and  all  depends  on  the 
intention  with  which  we  do  it,  so  that  we  may 
speak  against  our  minds  to  put  another  off,  but  not 
to  deceive  him,  then  certainly  the  intention  to 
deceive  must  be  imported  into  the  definition  of 
lying.  But  if,  as  we  shall  prove  presently,  the  act 
P 


226  OF  SPEAKING   THE   TRUTH. 

of  SO  speaking  is  by  no  means  indifferent  and  colour- 
less, but  is  fraught  with  an  inordinateness  all  its 
own,  then  the  intention  may  be  left  out  of  the  ques- 
tion, the  act  is  to  be  characterised  on  its  own 
merits,  and  speech  against  one's  mind  is  the  definition 
of  a  lie. 

3.  Then,  some  one  will  say,  it  would  be  a  lie  for 
a  prisoner  in  solitary  confinement  to  break  the 
silence  of  his  cell  with  the  exclamation,  Queen  Anne 
is  not  dead.  The  answer  is  simple :  it  takes  two  to 
make  a  speech.  A  man  does  not  properly  speak  to 
hjmself,  nor  quarrel  with  himself,  nor  deal  justly  by 
himself.  Not  that  it  would  be  a  lie  to  deny  the 
death  of  Queen  Anne  even  in  public  :  for  speech  is 
an  outward  affirmation,  the  appearance  of  a  serious 
will  to  apply  predicate  to  subject :  but  in  this  case 
there  is  no  appearance  of  a  serious  will :  on  the 
contrary,  from  the  manifest  absurdity  of  the  asser- 
tion, it  is  plain  that  you  are  joking  and  do  not  mean 
to  affirm  anything.  This  perhaps  is  as  far  as  we 
can  go  in  permission  of  what  are  called  lies  in  jest. 

Readings. — St  Thos.,  2a  232,  q.  no,  art.  i. 

Section  II. — Of  the  Evil  of  Lying. 

I.  Human  society  cannot  go  on,  if  men  are  to 
be  allowed  indiscriminately  to  lie  to  one  another. 
Thucydides  (iii.,  83)  gives  as  the  reason  of  the  ex- 
travagant length  to  which  faction  ran  in  Greece  in 
his  time  :  "  For  there  was  no  power  to  reconcile  the 
parties,  no  plighted  word  reliable,  no  oath  held  in 
awe."  Even  in  trifles  no  one  likes  to  be  lied  to,  and 
we  are  not  to  do  to  our  neighbour  what  we  would 


EVIL   OF  LYING.  227 


not  have  done  to  ourselves.  The  laws  of  good 
fellowship  require  that  we  should  "  put  away  lying, 
and  speak  the  truth  every  man  with  his  neighbour  : 
for  we  are  members  one  of  another."  (Ephesians 
iv.  25.)  This  at  least  in  ordinary  circumstances. 
The  same  good  fellowship  requires  that  in  ordinary 
circumstances  we  should  respect  the  lives  and 
property  of  our  fellow-men. 

2.  But  it  is  lawful  to  take  life  in  pursuance  of 
the  just  judgment  of  authority:  it  is  lawful  to  seize 
upon  property  in  self-preservation.  These  excep- 
tions stand  very  harmoniously  with  the  well-being 
of  society,  or  rather  are  required  by  it,  as  we  shall 
see  later  on.  The  law  against  lying,  so  far  as  it  is 
founded  on  the  general  prejudice  done  to  society  by 
the  shock  of  social  confidence,  and  on  the  particular 
annoyance  of  the  party  lied  to,  may  seem  to 
admit  of  similar  exceptions.  Whoever  has  no 
reasonable  objection  to  having  life  and  property 
taken  from  him  in  certain  contingencies,  can  he 
reasonably  complain  of  any  hurt  or  inconvenience 
that  he  may  suffer  from  a  lie  being  told  him  at 
times  ? 

3.  I  put  forward  this  difficulty,  not  as  though  it 
were  without  its  answer  in  the  principle  of  General 
Consequences  :  still  it  is  a  difficulty.  Besides,  if  the 
whole  harm  of  lying  is  in  the  unpleasant  effect 
wrought  upon  the  deceived  hearer,  and  the  scandal 
and  bad  consequences  to  society  at  large,  it  is  a 
long  way  to  go  round  to  show  that  lying  is  impos- 
sible to  God.  He  in  whose  dominion  are  all  the 
rights  and  claims  of  man,  is  not  to  be  restrained  by 


228  OF  SPEAKING   THE  TRUTH. 

the  mere  reluctance  of  His  creatuies  to  be  deceived, 
or  by  the  general  bad  effects  of  a  lie  upon  the  edifice 
of  human  credit.  As  Master  He  might  impose  this 
annoyance  upon  the  individual,  these  bad  conse- 
quences upon  society :  or  by  His  Providence  He 
might  prevent  their  occurring,  whenever  He  willed 
in  His  utterances  to  swerve  from  the  truth.  The 
only  help  for  the  argument  for  the  Divine  veracity 
on  these  grounds,  is  to  urge  with  Plato  that  none  of 
the  motives  which  lead  men  to  lie  can  ever  find 
place  in  the  mind  of  God :  that  a  lie  is  a  subter- 
fuge, an  economy,  a  device  resorted  to  under  stress 
of  circumstances,  such  as  can  never  serve  the  turn 
of  the  Supreme  Being.  But  though  God  be  inac- 
cessible to  human  reasons  for  departing  from  the 
truth,  may  He  not  have  higher  reasons,  mysterious, 
and  unsearchable,  for  such  a  deviation  ?  It  is  long 
arguing  out  this  point.  Better  bring  the  discussion 
sharp  round  with  the  question :  Is  there  not  some 
element  in  the  Divine  Nature  itself,  which  makes  it 
impossible  for  God  to  speak  false  ? 

4.  Undoubtedly  there  is  such  an  element,  deep 
down,  even  at  the  root  of  the  sanctity  of  God.  God 
is  holy  in  that,  being  by  essence  the  fulness  of  all 
being  and  all  goodness.  He  is  ever  true  to  Himself 
in  every  act  of  His  understanding,  of  His  will,  and 
of  His  power.  By  His  understanding  He  abidingly 
covers,  grasps,  and  comprehends  His  whole  Being. 
With  His  will  He  loves  Himself  supremely.  His 
power  is  exercised  entirely  for  His  glory — entirely, 
but  not  exclusively,  for  God's  last  and  best'  external 
^lory   is    in    the    consummated    happiness   of    His 


EVIL   OF   LYING.  229 


creatures.     Whatever  God  makes,  He  makes  in  His 

own  likeness,  more  or  less  so  according  to  the  degree 

of  being  which  He  imparts  to  the  creature.     And  as 

whatever  God  docs  is  like  Him,  and  whatever  God 

makes  is  like  Him,   so  whatever  God  says  is  like 

Him:    His   spoken   word    answers   to    His    inward 

word  and  thought.     It  holds  of  God   as  of  every 

being  who  has  a  thought  to  think  and  a  word  to 

utter: 

To  thine  own  self  be  true, 
And  it  must  follow  as  the  night  the  day, 
Thou  canst  not  then  be  false  to  any  man. 

5.  God's  sanctity  is  in  His  being  true  to  Himself. 
His  veracity  is  part  of  His  sanctity.  He  cannot  in 
His  speech,  or  revelation  of  Himself,  contradict 
what  He  really  has  in  His  mind,  without  ceasing  to 
be  holy  and  being  no  longer  God.  But  the  sanctity 
of  intellectual  creatures  must  be,  like  their  every 
other  pure  perfection,  modelled  on  the  corresponding 
perfection  of  their  Maker.  Holiness  must  mean 
truthfulness  in  man,  for  it  means  truthfulness  in 
God.  God's  words  cannot  be  at  variance  with  His 
thought,  for  God  is  essential  holiness.  Nor  can 
man  speak  otherwise  than  as  he  thinks  without 
marring  the  attribute  of  holiness  in  himself,  that  is, 
without  doing  wrong. 

6.  To  speak  against  one's  mind  is  an  act  falling 
upon  undue  matter.  Words  are  naturally  signs  of 
thoughts.  Not  that  the  words  of  any  given  language, 
as  English  or  German,  have  any  natural  connection 
with  the  thoughts  that  they  express ;  but  it  is  natural 
to  men,  natural  to  every  intellectual  being,  to   have 


230  OF  SPEAKING   THE    TRUTH. 

some  mode  of  expressing  his  thoughts  by  outward 
signs ;  and  once  a  sign  is  recognized  as  the  sign  of 
a  certain  thought,  so  long  as  the  convention  remains 
unrepealed,  whoever  uses  that  sign,  not  having  in 
his  mind  at  the  time  the  thought  which  that  sign 
signifies,  but  the  contradictory  to  it,  is  doing  violence 
to  the  natural  bond  between  sign  and  thing  signified, 
by  putting  forward  the  former  where  the  latter  is 
not  behind  it.  And  since  the  due  and  proper  matter 
for  the  sign  to  be  put  upon  is  the  presence  in  the 
mind  of  the  thought  signified,  to  make  that  sign 
where  the  opposite  thought  is  present,  is,  as  St. 
Thomas  says,  an  act  falling  upon  undue  matter. 
The  peculiar  spiritual  and  moral  inviolability  of  the 
connection  between  word  and  thought,  appears  from 
the  consideration  which  we  have  urged  of  the  arche- 
type holiness  of  God.  This  then  is  the  real,  in- 
trinsic, primary,  and  inseparable  reason,  why  lying, 
or  speech  in  contradiction  with  the  thought  of  the 
speaker,  is  everywhere  and  always  wrong. 

7.  Grotius  {De  Jure  Belli  et  Pads,  1.  iii.,  c.  i.,  nn.  11, 
seq.)  argues  a  lie  to  be  wrong  solely  inasmuch  as  it 
is  "  in  conflict  with  the  existing  and  abiding  right  of 
the  person  spoken  to."  Ifn^A^here  means  some- 
thing binding  in  commutative  justice  {Ethics,  c.  v.,  s.  ix., 
n.  6,  p.  106),  we  deny  that  any  such  right  is  violated  by 
what  is  called  a  simple  lie,  that  is,  an  untruth  not  in 
the  matter  of  religion,  and  not  affecting  the  character, 
property,  or  personal  well-being  of  our  neighbour. 
For  if  a  simple  lie  is  a  violation  of  commutative 
justice,  it  carries  the  obligation  of  restitution  (Ethics, 
c.  v.,  s.  ix.,  n.  6,  p.  107) ;  that  is,  we  are  bound  to  tell  the 


EVIL   OF  LYING.  2-1 


truth  afterwards  to  the  person  that  we  have  lied  to, 
even  in  a  matter  of  no  practical  consequence, — quite 
a  new  burden  on  the  consciences  of  men.  Again,  if 
the  bar  to  lying  were  the  hearer's  right,  whoever 
had  dominion  over  another's  right  might  lie  to  him  ; 
the  parent  might  lie  to  the  child,  the  State  to  the 
citizen,  and  God  to  man,  a  doctrine  which,  away 
from  its  application  to  God,  Grotius  accepts.  Lastly 
since  volenti  non  fit  injuria,  the  presumed  willingness 
of  the  listener  would  license  all  manner  of  officious 
and  jocose  lies,  as  the  authority  of  the  speaker 
would  sanction  official  fabrications.  Thus,  what 
with  official,  and  what  with  officious  speeches,  it 
would  be  very  hard  to  believe  anybody. 

8.  By  our  rejection  of  Grotius'  theory  we  are 
enabled  to  answer  Milton's  question  :  "  If  all  killing 
be  not  murder,  nor  all  taking  from  another,  stealing 
why  must  all  untruths  be  lies?"  Because,  we  say, 
killing  and  taking  away  of  goods  deal  v/ith  rights 
which  are  not  absolute  and  unlimited,  but  become 
in  certain  situations  void  ;  whereas  an  untruth  turns, 
not  on  another's  right,  but  on  the  exigency  of  the 
speaker's  own  rational  nature  calling  for  the  concord 
of  the  word  signifying  with  the  thought  signiHed, 
and  this  exigency  never  varies.  Untruth  and  false- 
hood are  but  polite  names  for  a  lie. 

Readings. — St.  Thos.,  2a  2£e,  q.  no,  art.  3,  in 
Corp.,  ad.  4 ;  ih.,  q.  log,  art.  2,  3,  in  corp. ;  Ar.,  Eth.j 
IV,,  vii. ;  Plato,  Rep.^  3S2,  3S9  b,  c. 


«32  OF  SPEAKING    THE   TRUTH. 


Section   III. — Of  the  keeping  of  Secrets  without  Lying. 

1.  There  are  natural  secrets,  secrets  of  promise, 
and  secrets  of  trust.  A  natural  secret  is  all  a  man's 
own  private  history,  which  he  would  not  have  made 
public,  as  also  all  that  he  discovers  b}'  his  own 
observation  of  the  similar  private  history  of  his 
neighbours.  If  a  man  finds  out  something  about 
his  neighbour,  and,  after  he  has  found  it  out  for 
himself,  the  neighbour  gets  him  to  promise  not  to 
publish  it,  that  is  a  secret  of  promise.  Lastly,  if  one 
man  comes  to  another,  as  to  a  lawyer,  or  a  surgeon, 
for  professional  advice,  or  simply  to  a  friend  for 
moral  counsel,  and  in  order  thereto  imparts  to  him 
some  of  his  natural  secrets,  those  secrets,  as  they 
are  received  and  held  by  the  person  consulted,  are 
called  secrets  of  trust.  This  latter  kind  of  secret  is 
privileged  above  the  other  two.  A  natural  secret, 
and  also  a  secret  of  promise,  must  be  delivered  up 
on  the  demand  of  an  authority  competent  to  inquire 
in  the  department  where  the  secret  lies.  But  a 
secret  of  trust  is  to  be  given  up  to  no  inquirer,  but 
to  be  kept  against  all  v/ho  endeavour  to  come  by  it, 
except  where  the  matter  bodes  mischief  and  wrong 
to  a  third  party,  or  to  the  community,  and  where  at 
the  same  time  the  owner  of  the  secret  cannot  be 
persuaded  to  desist  from  the  wrong.  This  proviso 
does  not  hold  for  the  seal  of  confession,  which  is  abso- 
lutely inviolable. 

2.  The  main  art  of  keeping  a  secret  is,  not  to 
talk  about  it.  If  a  man  is  asked  an  awkward  ques- 
tion, and  sees  no  alternative  but  to  let  out  or  lie,  it 


KEEPING   OF   SECRETS    WITHOUT   LYING.  233 

is  usually  his  own  fault  for  having  introduced  the 
subject,  or  encouraged  the  questioner  up  to  that 
point.  A  wise  man  lets  drop  in  time  topics  which 
he  is  unwilling  to  have  pressed.  But  there  are 
unconscionable  people  who  will  not  be  put  off,  and 
who,  either  out  of  malice  or  out  of  stupidity,  ply  you 
with  questions  against  all  rules  of  good  breeding. 
This  direct  assault  may  sometimes  be  retaliated, 
and  a  rude  question  met  by  a  curt  answer.  But 
such  a  reply  is  not  always  prudent  or  charitable, 
and  would  not  unfrequently  copvey  the  very  infor- 
mation required.  Silence  would  serve  no  better,  for 
silence  gives  consent,  and  is  eloquent  at  times. 
There  is  nothing  left  for  it  in  such  cases  but  to  lock 
your  secret  up,  as  it  were,  in  a  separate  compartment 
of  your  breast,  and  answer  according  to  the  re- 
mainder of  your  information,  which  is  not  secret, 
private,  and  confidential.  This  looks  very  much 
like  lying,  but  it  is  not  lying,  it  is  speaking  the  truth 
under  a  broad  menial  reservation. 

3.  Mental  reservation  is  an  act  of  the  mind, 
limiting  the  spoken  phrase  so  that  it  may  not  bear 
the  full  sense  which  at  first  hearing  it  seems  to  bear. 
The  reservation,  or  limitation  of  the  spoken  sense, 
is  said  to  be  hroad  or  ptire,  according  as  it  is,  or  is 
not,  indicated  externally.  A  pure  mental  reservation, 
where  the  speaker  uses  words  in  a  limited  meaning, 
without  giving  any  outward  clue  to  the  limitation, 
is  in  nothing  different  from  a  lie,  and  is  wrong  as  a 
lie  is  always  wrong.  A  good  instance  is  Archbishop 
Cranmer's  oath  of  fealty  to  the  Pope,  he  having 
previously   protested — of  course   out  of  hearing  ol 


234  OF  SPEAKING    THE   TRUTH. 


the  Pope  or  the  Pope's  representative — that  he 
meant  that  oath  in  no  way  to  preclude  him  from 
labouring  at  the  reformation  of  the  Church  in 
England,  that  is,  doing  all  the  evil  work  which  Henry 
VIII.  had  marked  out  for  him  in  the  teeth  of  the 
Roman  Bishop.*  Even  broad  mental  reservation  is 
permissible  only  as  a  last  resource,  when  no  other 
means  are  available  for  the  preservation  of  some 
secret  which  one  has  a  duty  to  others,  or  grave 
reason  of  one's  own,  to  keep. 

4.  The  point  to  make  out  is  that  no  lie  is  told. 
To  speak  under  a  reservation  is  a  lie,  if  it  is  speech 
against  the  mind  of  the  speaker.  But  how  can  it 
be  aught  else  than  speech  against  the  mind,  when 
the  heart  thinks  yea,  and  the  tongue  says  nay  ?  We 
answer  that,  in  the  case  contemplated,  the  thought 
of  the  heart  is,  secrets  apart,  nay ;  and  though  the 
word  on  the  lips  is  nay  simply,  yet  we  must  not  take 
that  word  as  the  whole  locution,  but  as  a  mere  text, 
to  which  the  situation  of  the  speaker  and  the  matter 
spoken  of  form  a  commentary,  legible  to  any  obser- 
vant eye.  The  word  is  an  annotated  text ;  nay  in  the 
body  of  the  page,  with  secrets  apart  inscribed  in  the 
margin.  The  adequate  utterance  is  the  whole  page, 
text  and  gloss  together ;  that  speech  answers  to  the 
thought  in  the  speaker's  mind ;  therefore  it  is  no  lie. 

5.  The  essential  requisite  is  that  the  gloss,  secrets 
apart,  be  not  written  in  the  speaker's  private  mind, 
but  be  outwardly  and  publicly  manifest  in  the  matter 
spoken  of,  which  must  be  one  that  clearly  admits  of 

♦  Strype's  Cranmer,  i.,  pp  27,  28 ;  ib.,  ii.,  Appendices  5,  6  ;  ed 
Oxoa.,  1812. 


KEEPING   OF  SECRETS    WITHOUT  LYING.         235 

secrets,  and  in  the  circumstances  of  the  speaker, 
who  is  driven  into  a  corner,  and  obliged  to  answer 
something,  and  yet  cannot  by  any  prudent  man  be 
expected  to  answer  out  of  the  fulness  of  all  the 
knowledge  that  he  may  possibly  possess. 

6.  Nor  let  it  be  said  that  all  confidence  in  the 
replies  given  to  our  questions  is  hereby  destroyed. 
For  most  questions  are  in  matters  that  do  not  admit 
of  a  secret.  There  the  qualification,  secrets  apart, 
which  may  be  said  to  attach  to  all  answers,  has  no 
value  and  meaning :  it  is  mathematically  equal  to 
zero  ;  and  we  may  take  the  answer  in  full  assurance 
just  as  it  reaches  our  ear.  Again,  when  a  person 
volunteers  a  statement  unasked,  he  cannot  be  sup- 
posed to  be  reserving  secrets.  But  when  delicate 
subjects  are  touched  on,  and  inquiry  is  pushed  to 
extremity  by  an  unauthorized  questioner,  secrets 
apart  is  the  handwriting  on  the  wall. 

7.  But  why  is  not  this  qualification  spoken  out 
with  the  tongue  ?  Sometimes  it  safely  may  be,  and 
then  it  should  be  so  added.  But,  as  the  addition  is 
unusual,  our  taking  the  trouble  to  express  it  would 
often  certify  to  the  inquirer  that  his  suspicions  were 
correct,  though  we  ought  not  to  tell  him  so.  Our 
aim  then  must  be  to  give  such  an  oral  answer  as 
we  should  return,  were  the  suspicion  quite  unfounded. 
Our  questioner,  if  he  is  a  prudent  man,  will  piece 
out  our  phrase  with  the  addition,  secrets  apart ;  and 
he  will  understand  that  he  can  get  nothing  out  of 
us  either  way,  which  is  exactly  what  we  wish  him  to 
understand.  His  unauthorized  interrogatory  has 
been  met  by  speech  that  amounts  to  silence,  arguing 


236  OF  SPEAKING   THE   TRUTH. 

indeed  our  prudence,  but  leaving  him  as  wise  as 
before  on  the  forbidden  topic.  If  he  is  a  thoughtless 
man,  he  is  deceived,  not  by  any  intention  or  election 
of  ours,  but  indirectly  so  far  as  we  are  concerned, 
an  incidental  deception  which  he  has  brought  on 
himself. 

8.  This  then  is  a  convention  that  obtains,  not 
of  positive  institution,  but  dictated  by  nature  herself, 
that  on  a  matter  which  admits  of  being  secret,  any 
answer  elicited  under  stress  of  necessity  must  be 
so  construed,  as  that  any  grave  secret  that  may  be 
touched,  not  being  morally  in  the  power  of  the 
respondent  to  reveal,  shall  be  taken  to  remain 
reserved. 

9.  We  may  therefore  sometimes  avoid  seeming 
to  know  what  we  know,  or  to  be  what  we  are.  But 
we  may  never  of  our  own  proper  motion  step  for- 
ward and  court  observation  as  being  what  we  are 
not,  or  knowing  what  is  against  or  beyond  our 
knowledge.  We  may  dissemble  occasionally,  but 
not  simulate.  The  dissembler  of  a  secret  wishes 
for  obscurity  and  silence :  he  wants  to  have  the 
eyes  of  men  turned  away  from  him  and  their 
curiosity  unroused.  Whatever  he  says  or  does  is 
to  divest  the  idea  of  there  being  anything  particularly 
interesting  about  him.  But  he  who  simulates — call 
him  pretender,  impostor,  or  quack — is  nothing,  if 
not  taken  notice  of.  The  public  gaze  is  his  sun- 
shine :  obscurity  gives  him  a  deadly  chill.  His 
ambition  is  to  appear  out  of  the  ordinary,  being 
really  quite  within  common  lines :  the  dissembler 
is  in  some  respect  beyond  the  ordinary,  but  wishes 


OF  CHARITY. 


»17 


not  to  show  himself  otherwise  than  as  an  ordinary 
mortal  with  ordinary  knowledge.  The  pretender  is 
on  the  offensive,  challenging  attention  :  the  dis- 
sembler is  on  his  defence  against  notice.  "  Simu- 
lation," says  Bolingbroke,  "  is  a  stiletto,  not  only 
an  offensive  but  an  unlawful  weapon,  and  the  use 
of  it  may  be  rarely,  very  rarely,  excused,  but  never 
justified.  Dissimulation  is  a  shield,  as  secrecy  is 
armour :  and  it  is  no  more  possible  to  preserve 
secrecy  in  the  administration  of  public  affairs  with- 
out dissimulation  than  it  is  to  succeed  in  it  without 
secrecy."  {Idea  of  a  Patriot  King.) 

Readings. — De  Lugo,  De  Just,  et  Jure,  14,  nn.  135, 
141,  142  ;  The  Month  for  March,  1883 ;  Lockhart's 
Life  of  Scott,  vi.,  26. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

OF   CHARITY. 

I.  It  is  the  difference  between  sensible  apprehension 
and  intellectual  knowledge,  that  the  former  seizes 
upon  a  particular  object  and  it  only,  as  this  sweet: 
the  latter  takes  its  object  as  the  type  of  a  class  of 
similars,  this  and  the  like  of  this,  this  sweet  as  one  of 
the  class  of  sweet  things.  In  like  manner  the  love  of 
passion,  which  is  the  love  of  sense,  regards  one  sole 
object.  Titius  is  in  love  with  Bertha  alone,  not 
with  woman  in  general.  But  an  intellectual  love 
is  the  love  of  a  type  of  beauty  or  goodness,  of  this 
object  and  of  others  as  they  approach  in  likeness 


»3«  OF  CHARITY. 


to  it.  Whoever  loves  William  from  an  intellectual 
appreciation  of  his  patriotism,  in  loving  him  loves 
all  patriots.  Every  animal  loves  itself  with  a  brute, 
sensible  love,  not  a  love  to  find  fault  with,  nor  yet 
a  noble  and  exalted  sentiment — a  love  purely  self- 
regarding,  quite  apart  from  the  good  that  is  in  self, 
but  embracing  self  simply  as  self,  and  self  alone. 
This  is  the  first  love  of  self  even  in  man.  But  over 
and  above  this  animal  and  sensible  love,  which  no 
man  lacks,  there  is  in  all  men  worthy  of  the  name 
a  second  self-regarding  affection  of  an  intellectual 
cast,  whereby  a  man  loves  himself  as  discerning 
with  the  eye  of  his  soul  the  excellence  of  his  own 
nature — "  how  noble  in  reason,  how  infinite  in 
faculty,  in  form  and  moving  how  express  and 
admirable,  in  action  how  like  an  angel,  in  appre- 
hension how  like  a  god,  the  beauty  of  the  world, 
the  paragon  of  animals."  Intellectual  self-com- 
placence overflows  from  self  to  similars.  It  is  not 
self-love,  it  is  love  of  the  race,  "  the  milk  of  human 
kindness,"  philanthropy. 

2.  But  man  is  a  disappointing  creature,  after  all 
a  mere  "quintessence  of  dust,"  unless  he  can  rise 
above  himself  by  relation  with  some  superhuman 
being,  and  make  his  final  fortune  in  some  better 
region  than  this  world.  Reason  requires  that  we 
love  ourselves,  and  love  our  fellow-men,  for  and  in 
order  to  the  development  of  the  highest  gifts  and 
capacities  that  are  in  us.  These  are  gifts  and 
capacities  divine,  preparing  us  to  find  our  everlast- 
ing happiness  in  God.  {Ethics,  c.  ii.,  s.  iv.,  n.  2,  p.  22.) 
The  love  that  we  bear  to  ourselves  and  our  neigh- 


OF  CHARITY.  239 


bour,  in  view  of  our  coming  from  God  and 
going  to  God,  is  called  the  love  of  charity.  Charity 
differs  from  philanthropy  in  looking  beyond  the 
present  life,  and  above  creatures.  A  materialist 
and  atheist  may  possess  philanthropy,  but  not 
charity. 

3.  Beside  the  twofold  love,  animal  and  intellec- 
tual, which  we  bear  ourselves,  we  may  also  and 
should  love  ourselves  with  the  love  of  charity,  seeing 
God's  gifts  in  us,  and  desiring  the  perfection  of 
those  gifts  in  a  happy  eternity  occupied  with  God. 
The  charity  which  we  should  thus  bear  to  ourselves 
is  the  model  of  that  which  we  owe  to  our  neighbour, 
whom  we  are  to  love  as  ourselves,  not  with  the  same 
intensity,  but  with  the  same  quality  of  love,  wishing 
him  the  good,  human  and  divine,  temporal  and 
eternal,  which  we  wish  for  ourselves,  though  not  so 
earnestly  as  we  wish  it  for  ourselves.  Our  love  for 
ourselves  is  stronger  than  for  our  neighbour:  for,  if 
love  comes  of  likeness,  much  more  does  it  come  of 
identity.  But  by  reason  of  the  vast  preponderance 
of  the  good  that  is  rational  and  eternal  over  that 
which  is  material  and  temporal ;  and  also  by  reason 
of  the  principle  laid  down  by  St.  Thomas,  that 
*'  as  to  the  sharing  together  of  (eternal)  happiness, 
greater  is  the  union  of  our  neighbour's  soul  with 
our  soul  than  even  of  our  own  body  with  our  soul  " 
(2a  2ae,  q.  26,  art.  5,  ad  2), — we  are  bound  to 
love  our  neighbour's  eternal  good  better  than  our 
own  temporal  good,  and  in  certain  special  conjunc- 
tures to  sacrifice  the  latter  to  the  former.  We  have 
no  duty  and  obligation  of  loving  his  temporal  good 


240  OF   CHARITY. 


above  our  own  temporal  good.  But  it  is  often 
matter  of  commendation  and  counsel  to  sacrifice 
our  temporal  interest  to  our  neighbour's.  This 
sacriiice  is  no  breach  of  the  order  of  charity,  be- 
ginning at  home  :  since  what  is  resigned  of  material 
and  perishable  profit  is  gained  in  moral  perfection. 
Especially  commendable  is  the  surrender  of  private 
good  for  the  good  of  the  community.  Charity,  or 
philanthropy,  taking  this  form,  bears  the  name  of 
patriotism  and  public  spirit. 

4.  Charity,  like  material  forces,  acts  in  a  certain 
inverse  ratio  to  the  distance  of  the  object.  Other 
considerations  being  equal,  the  nearer,  the  dearer. 
Nay,  nearness  and  likeness  to  ourselves  goes  further 
than  goodness  in  winning  our  love.  This  is  natural, 
and  charity  presupposes  nature,  and  follows  its 
order.  As  we  have  more  charity  for  ourselves  than 
for  others  whom  we  acknowledge  to  be  better  men, 
so  likewise  for  our  kinsmen  and  intimate  friends. 
We  may  put  the  matter  thus.  Charity  consists  in 
wishing  and  seeking  to  procure  for  a  person  the 
good  that  leads  to  God.  One  element  is  the 
intensity  and  eagerness  of  this  wish  and  search  ; 
another  is  the  greatness  of  the  good  wished.  Now 
we  wish  those  who  are  better  than  ourselves  to  be 
rewarded  according  to  their  deserts  with  a  greater 
good  than  ourselves :  but  this  wish  is  but  lukewarm 
compared  to  the  intensity  of  our  desire  that  we  and 
our  friends  with  us  may  attain  to  all  the  good  that 
we  are  capable  of. 

5.  The  Christian  precept  to  love  our  enemies  is 
merely  the  enforcement  of  a  natural  obligation.   The 


OF  CHARITY.  241 


obligation  stands  almost  self-evident  as  soon  as  it 
is  cleared  of  misunderstanding.  The  love  of  enemies 
is  not  based  on  the  ground  of  their  being  hostile 
and  annoying  us.  It  would  be  highly  unnatural  to 
love  them  on  that  score.  Nor  are  we  in  duty  bound 
to  show  to  one  who  hates  us  special  offices  of  friend- 
ship, except  we  find  him  in  extreme  need,  e.g.,  dying 
in  a  ditch,  as  the  Good  Samaritan  found  the  Jew : 
otherwise  it  is  enough  that  we  be  animated  towards 
him  with  that  common  charity,  which  we  bear  to 
other  men  who  are  not  further  off  from  us  than  he 
is.  If  Lucius  offend  Titius,  there  being  no  other 
tie  between  them  than  the  tie  of  friendship,  Titius 
may,  where  the  offence  is  very  outrageous,  hence- 
forth treat  Lucius  as  a  stranger.  The  question  of 
scandal  has  sometimes  to  be  regarded,  but  that  is 
an  extrinsic  circumstance  to  our  present  subject. 
Nor  are  we  concerned  to  say  what  is  the  better 
thing  for  Titius  to  do,  but  to  say  all  that  he  is 
bound  to  do.  He  is  bound  to  render  himself  as 
void  of  wilful  malice,  and  as  full  of  ordinary  courtesy 
and  good  feeling  towards  Lucius,  as  he  is  in  the 
case  of  Sempronius,  a  man  whom  he  never  heard  of 
till  this  day.  But  if  there  be  some  other  antecedent 
tie  between  them  besides  the  tie  of  friendship, — for 
instance,  if  Titius  and  Lucius  are  two  monks  of  the 
same  convent,  two  officers  in  the  same  regiment,  two 
partners  of  one  firm, — Titius  is  no  longer  justified 
in  treating  Lucius  as  a  stranger.  He  must  regard 
him  with  ordinary  charity ;  now  ordinary  charity 
between  two  brother-officers,  or  two  fellow-monks, 
is  not  the  same  as  between  men  who  have  no  such 


Z42  OF  CHARITY. 


tie  one  with  another.  This  is  why  we  laid  it  down 
that  we  must  be  animated  towards  him  who  has 
offended  us  "  with  that  common  charity,  which  we 
bear  to  other  men  who  are  not  further  off  from  us 
than  he  is." 

6.  This  then  being  the  exact  obhgation,  the 
same  is  easily  estabhshed.  We  must  love  our 
enemies,  because  the  reasons  given  for  loving  all 
mankind  (nn.  i,  2)  are  not  vitiated  by  this  or  that 
man  having  treated  us  shamefully.  The  human 
nature  in  him  still  remains  good  actually,  and  still 
more,  potentially ;  and  if  good  and  hopeful,  to  that 
extent  also  lovable.  Nor  is  this  lovableness  a  mere 
separable  accident.  Rather,  it  is  the  offensive  beha- 
viour of  the  man  that  is  the  separable  accident. 
At  that  we  may  well  be  disgusted  and  abominate  it. 
But  the  underlying  substance  remains  good,  not 
incurably  tainted  with  that  vicious  accident.  We 
must  attend  to  the  substance,  which  is,  rather  than 
to  the  accident,  which  happens,  and  may  be  abo- 
lished. Let  us  endeavour  to  abolish  the  accident, 
still  so  that  we  respect  and  regard  the  substance. 
Let  us  seek  for  redress  under  the  guidance  of 
prudence  according  to  the  circumstances  of  the 
case,  but  not  for  the  ruin  of  our  enemy.  Let  us 
not  render  evil  for  evil,  but  even  in  exacting  a  just 
satisfaction,  make  it  of  the  nature  of  that  compen- 
satory evil,  which  is  by  consequence  good.  Let  us 
he  angry  with  our  enemy,  but  sin  not  by  hating  him. 
{Ethics,  c.  iv.,  s.  iv.,  n.  3.)  We  may  seek  satis- 
faction for  any  wrong  we  have  suffered :  in  grave 
cases  we  must  have  recourse  to  the  State  for  that: 


OF  CHARITY.  343 


but  the  sin,  if  any,  of  our  adversary  is  not  our 
concern  to  punish  or  to  seek  vengeance  for.  {Ethics, 
c.  ix.,  s.  iii.,  n.  4.) 

7.  The  same  reasoning  holds  good  even  of  public 
enemies,  tyrants,  persecutors,  anarchists,  assassins. 
We  must  include  them  in  our  prayers,  wish  for 
their  conversion,  and,  though  their  case  appear 
hopeless,  we  must  not  damn  them  before  their 
time.  If  we  found  one  of  them  dying  by  accident 
of  cold  or  asphyxia,  we  should  be  bound  by  a  grave 
obligation  to  use  all  ordinary  efforts  to  bring  him 
round  and  recover  him.  Still  we  may  use  our  best 
efforts  to  bring  them  to  justice,  even  to  capital 
punishment,  according  to  the  procedure  of  public 
law  established  in  the  country,  and  not  otherwise. 
We  may  also  with  an  inefficacious  desire,  that  is,  a 
desire  that  finds  no  vent  in  action,  desire  their 
death  under  an  alternative  thus,  that  either  living 
they  may  cease  to  do  evil,  or  that  God  may  call 
them  away  to  where  the  wicked  cease  from  troub- 
ling. But  we  must  not  desire,  nor  be  glad  of,  their 
death  by  any  unlawful  means,  for  that  were  to  sym- 
pathise with  crime. 

8.  Real  charity  shows  itself  in  action,  succouring 
a  neighbour  in  need,  which  is  sometimes  a  counsel, 
sometimes  a  duty.  It  is  an  axiom,  that  charity  is 
not  binding  with  grave  inconvenience.  The  gravity  of 
the  inconvenience  in  prospect  must  be  measured 
against  the  urgency  of  the  need  to  be  relieved.  A 
neighbour  is  technically  said  to  be  in  extreme  need, 
when  he  is  in  imminent  peril  of  deadly  evil  to  soul 
or  body,  and  is  unable  to  help  himself.     We  are 


244  OF  RIGHTS. 


under  severe  obligation  of  charity  to  succour  any 
whom  we  find  in  this  phght. 

g.  By  charity  we  give  of  our  own  to  another :  by 
justice  we  render  to  another  that  which  is  his. 
Charity  neglected  calls  for  no  restitution,  when 
the  need  that  required  it  is  past  away :  justice 
violated  cries  for  restitution,  for  what  we  have 
taken  away  from  our  neighbour  remains  still  his. 
The  obligations  of  justice  are  negative,  except  for 
the  fulfilment  of  contracts:  obligations  in  charity 
are  largely  positive.  {Ethics,  c.  v.,  s.  ix.,  n.  7,  p.  108.) 

Readings. — C.  Gent.,  III.,  117;  2a  2se,  q.  26, 
art.  4;  ib.,  art.  7;  ib.,  art.  8;  2a  28e,  q.  25,  art.  8; 
ib.,  art.  g :  ib.,  art.  6 ;  Ferrier,  Greek  Philosophy, 
Socrates,  nn.  13,  26,  27,  2g.  {Remains,  vol.  i.,  pp. 
227,  seq.) 


CHAPTER   V. 

OF    RIGHTS. 

Section  I. — Of  the  definition  and  division  of  Rights. 

I.  A  right  is  that  in  virtue  of  which  a  person  calls 
anything  his  own.  More  elaborately,  a  right  is  a 
moral  power  residing  in  a  person,  in  virtue  whereof  he 
refers  to  himself  as  well  his  own  actions  as  also  other 
ihitigs,  which  stand  referred  to  him  in  preference  to  other 
persons.  A  right  is  a  moral  power,  as  distinguished 
from  physical  force  or  ability.  It  resides  in  2i person,  a 
being  whom  we  call  aiitocentric,  as  distinguished  from 
a  thing,  which  is  heterocentric.  (c.  ii.,  s.  i.,  n.  2,  p.  203.) 


DEFINITION   AND   DIVISION   OF   RIGHTS.  245 

A  person  is  his  own,  a  thing  is  another's.  Every 
intellectual  nature  is  a  person  except  the  Humanity 
of  Christ,  an  exception  which  does  not  concern  us 
here.  To  the  Creator  all  created  personalities  are 
as  things,  but  that  again  is  not  our  concern  in  this 
place,  where  we  treat  of  the  relations  between  man 
and  man.  It  will  have  to  be  noted  hereafter  ^vith 
great  emphasis,  that  the  individual  man  is  a  person, 
not  a  thing  and  chattel,  in  relation  to  the  State,  and 
consequently  has  rights  against  the  State. 

2.  Every  intellectual  being  has  the  attribute  of 
reflex  consciousness.  It  may  turn  its  regard  in  upon 
itself,  and  call  itself  mc,  and  its  powers  and  activities 
})iine.  It  certainly  has  the  physical  ability  of  acting 
for  self,  and  using  its  powers  consciously  for  its  own 
ends.  Does  this  physical  ability  represent  also  a 
moral  power?  Is  the  agent  justified  in  exercising 
it  ?  and  are  his  fellows  under  a  moral  obligation 
of  justice  to  leave  him  free  to  exercise  it  ?  {Ethics,  c. 
vi.,  s.  i.,  nn.  5.  6,  p.  iii.)  We  have  seen  that  morality 
consists  in  acting  up  to  one's  own  intellectual  or 
rational  nature.  Since  then  the  calling  oneself 
me,  and  one's  power  mine,  and  the  using  those 
powers  for  purposes  which  one's  reason  approves, 
is  the  distinguishing  feature  of  an  intellectual,  or 
rational,  and  personal  being,  that  being  is  morally 
warranted  so  to  act.  He  calls  himself  his  own,  and 
his  powers  his  own,  and  they  are  his  own  by  the 
very  fact  of  his  calling  them  so  by  a  natural  act. 
And,  as  justice  is  to  give  to  another  his  own,  others 
arc  bound  in  justice  to  leave  him  free  to  dispose  of 
himself    and    his    powers,    at    least    within    certain 


246  OF   RIGHTS. 


limits.  But  this  would  be  for  man  a  barren  free- 
dom, were  he  not  empowered  to  lay  hold  of  and 
make  his  own  some  things,  nay  many  things,  out- 
side of  himself,  for  man  is  not  self-sufficient,  but 
has  many  natural  necessities,  and  many  psychical 
cravings  to  boot.  Therefore  man's  right  of  pre- 
ference extends,  not  only  to  his  own  actions,  but 
also  to  external  things,  which  he  may  make  his  own 
to  act  upon. 

3.  Rights  are  either  connatural  or  acquired.  Con- 
natural rights  spring  from  the  very  being  of  a  man, 
as  he  is  a  person.  Such  are  the  rights  to  life,  to 
honour,  to  personal  liberty — that  is,  freedom  to  go 
where  you  will — to  civil  liberty — that  is,  not  being 
a  slave — also  the  rights  to  marry  and  to  acquire 
property.  Acquired  rights  spring  from  some  deed 
of  man,  annexing  something  to  his  personality. 
Such  are  the  rights  to  property,  duly  entered  upon, 
to  reputation,  to  the  political  franchise,  and  all 
rights  that  come  by  contract.  Acquired  rights  may 
descend  to  heirs. 

4.  Rights  again  are  alienable  and  inalienable, 
which  division  does  not  coincide  with  the  preced- 
ing. Those  rights  are  inalienable,  shorn  of  which 
a  man  cannot  work  out  his  last  end.  Some  rights 
are  thus  permanently  and  universally  inalienable, 
as  the  right  to  life :  others  are  so  occasionally  and 
for  particular  persons. 

5.  The  correlative  of  right  is  duty  :  so  that,  wher- 
ever one  man  has  a  right,  his  neighbours  have  a 
duty  in  justice  to  leave  him  free  to  exercise  the 
same.     But  the  converse  is  not  true,  that  wherever 


DEFINITION   AND   DIVISION   OF  RIGHTS.  247 

one  man  has  a  duty  towards  another,  that  other 
has  a  right  to  its  performance,  for  there  are  duties 
of  charity,  which  do  not  impart  a  corresponding 
right,  but  only  a  claim.  Diilies  that  correspond 
to  rights  are  called  by  English  moralists  perfect 
duties.  Duties  answering  to  claims  only  they  call 
imperfect. 

6.  Of  duties,  some  are  positive,  which  bind  always, 
not  for  always,  as  the  duty  of  adoring  God.  We 
are  always  bound  to  adore,  we  are  not  bound  to  be 
always  adoring.  Other  duties  are  negative,  and 
bind  always,  for  always,  as  the  duties  of  sobriety 
and  chastity.  The  former  class  of  duties  we  may 
more  easily  be  excused  from,  because  they  can  be 
deferred,  and  it  is  at  times  morally  impossible  to 
take  them  up.  But  negative  duty,  as  Mr.  Gladstone 
has  finely  said,  **  rises  with  us  in  the  morning,  and 
goes  to  rest  with  us  at  night :  it  is  the  shadow  that 
follows  us  wheresoever  we  go,  and  only  leaves  us 
when  we  leave  the  light  of  life." 

7.  Only  a  persoti  has  rights,  as  appears  by  the 
definition  of  a  right.  Again,  only  persons  have 
duties,  for  they  only  have  free  will.  No  one  has 
duties  without  rights,  and  no  man  has  rights  with- 
out duties.  Infants  and  idiots,  in  whom  the  use  ol 
reason  is  impeded,  having  notwithstanding  rights, 
are  said  to  have  duties  also  radically.  Hence  it  is 
wrong  to  make  an  idiot  commit  what  is  in  him  a 
material  breach  of  some  negative  duty,  as  of  tem- 
perance.    Positive  duties  he  is  excused  from. 

8.  Some  have  taught  that  all  human  rights  are 
consequences  of  duties;  a  man  having  first  a  dutv 


248  OF  RIGHTS. 


to  perform,  and  then  a  right  to  the  means  necessary 
to  its  performance.  But  this  doctrine  appears  more 
pious  than  probable.  For,  first,  the  type  and 
example  of  sovereign  right,  God,  has  no  duties. 
{Eiliics,  c.  vi.,  s.  ii.,  n.  4,  p.  130.)  Then  again,  a 
man  may  have  a  right  conjoined  with  a  duty — not 
of  justice,  of  course,  but  of  some  other  virtue,  as 
of  religion — not  to  use  that  right.  But  if  rights 
were  consequent  upon  duties,  the  right  would  cease 
in  such  a  case ;  and  to  pretend  to  exercise  it  would 
be  a  sin  against  justice,  which  it  is  not. 

Section  II. — Of  the  so-called  Rights  of  Animals. 

I.  Brute  beasts,  not  having  understanding  and 
therefore  not  being  persons,  cannot  have  any  rights. 
The  conclusion  is  clear.  They  are  not  autocentric. 
They  are  of  the  number  of  tilings,  which  are  another's : 
they  are  chattels,  or  cattle.  We  have  no  duties  to 
them, — not  of  justice,  as  is  shown  ;  not  of  religion, 
unless  we  are  to  worship  them,  like  the  Egyptians  of 
old  ;  not  of  fidelity,  for  they  are  incapable  of  accept- 
ing a  promise.  The  only  question  can  be  of  charity. 
Have  we  duties  of  charity  to  the  lower  animals  ? 
Charity  is  an  extension  of  the  love  of  ourselves  to 
beings  like  ourselves,  in  view  of  our  common  nature 
and  our  common  destiny  to  happiness  in  God.  (c.  iv., 
nn.  I,  2,  p.  239.)  It  is  not  for  the  present  treatise 
to  prove,  but  to  assume,  that  our  nature  is  not 
common  to  brute  beasts  but  immeasurably  above 
theirs,  higher  indeed  above  them  than  we  are 
below  the    angels.      Man  alone  speaks,  man  alone 


SO-CALLED   RIGHTS  OF  ANIMALS.  249 

hopes  to  contemplate  for  ever,  if  not — in  the  natural 
order — the  Face  of  his  Father  in  Heaven,  at  least 
the  reflected  brightness  of  that  Divine  Face.  {Ethics, 
c.  ii.,  s.  iv.,  nn.  3,  4.)  We  have  then  no  duties 
of  charity,  nor  duties  of  any  kind,  to  the  lower 
animals,  as  neither  to  stocks  and  stones. 

2.  Still  we  have  duties  about  stones,  not  to  fling 
them  through  our  neighbour's  windows ;  and  we 
have  duties  about  brute  beasts.  We  must  not  harm 
them,  when  they  are  our  neighbour's  property. 
We  must  not  break  out  into  paroxysms  of  rage  and 
impatience  in  dealing  with  them.  It  is  a  miserable 
way  of  showing  off  human  pre-eminence,  to  torture 
poor  brutes  in  malevolent  glee  at  their  pain  and 
helplessness.  Such  wanton  cruelty  is  especially 
deplorable,  because  it  disposes  the  perpetrators  to 
be  cruel  also  to  men.  As  St.  Thomas  says  (la  2ae, 
q.  102,  art.  6,  ad  8) : 

"  Because  the  passion  of  pity  arises  from  the 
afflictions  of  others,  and  it  happens  even  to  brute 
animals  to  feel  pain,  the  affection  of  pity  may 
arise  in  man  even  about  the  afflictions  of  animals. 
Obviously,  whoever  is  practised  in  the  affection  of 
pity  towards  animals,  is  thereby  more  disposed  to 
the  affection  of  pity  towards  men :  whence  it  is  said 
in  Proverbs  xii.  10:  'The  just  regardeth  the  lives  of 
his  beasts,  but  the  bowels  of  the  wicked  are  cruel.' 
And  therefore  the  Lord,  seeing  the  Jewish  people  to 
be  cruel,  that  He  might  reclaim  them  to  pity,  wished 
to  train  them  to  pity  even  towards  brute  beasts,  for- 
bidding certain  things  to  be  done  to  animals  which 
seem  to   touch    upon    cruelty.      And   therefore   He 


a50  OF  RIGHTS. 


forbade  them  to  seethe  the  kid  in  the  mother's 
milk  (Deut.  xiv.  21),  or  to  muzzle  the  treading 
ox  (Deut.  XXV.  4),  or  to  kill  the  old  bird  with  the 
young."  (Deut.  xxii.  6,  7.) 

3.  It  is  wanton  cruelty  to  vex  and  annoy  a  brute 
beast  for  sport.  This  is  unworthy  of  man,  and 
disposes  him  to  inhumanity  towards  his  own  species. 
Yet  the  converse  is  not  to  be  relied  on :  there  have 
been  cruel  men  who  have  made  pets  of  the  brute 
creation.  But  there  is  no  shadow  of  evil  resting  on 
the  practice  of  causing  pain  to  brutes  m  sport,  where 
the  pain  is  not  the  sport  itself,  but  an  incidental 
concomitant  of  it.  Much  more  in  all  that  conduces 
to  the  sustenance  of  man  may  we  give  pain  to 
brutes,  as  also  ,in  the  pursuit  of  science.  Nor  are 
we  bound  to  any  anxious  care  to  make  this  pain  as 
little  as  may  be.  Brutes  are  as  things  in  our  regard : 
so  far  as  they  are  useful  to  us,  they  exist  for  us, 
not  for  themselves ;  and  we  do  right  in  using  them 
unsparingly  for  our  need  and  convenience,  though 
not  for  our  wantonness.  If  then  any  special  case 
of  pain  to  a  brute  creature  be  a  fact  of  considerable 
value  for  observation  in  biological  science  or  the 
medical  art,  no  reasoned  considerations  of  morality 
can  stand  in  the  way  of  man  making  the  experiment, 
yet  so  that  even  in  the  quest  of  science  he  be  mindful 
of  mercy. 

4.  Altogether  it  will  be  found  that  a  sedulous 
observance  of  the  rights  and  claims  of  other  men, 
a  mastery  over  one's  own  passions,  and  a  reverence 
for  the  Creator,  give  the  best  assurance  of  a  wise 
and  humane  treatment  of  the  lower  animals.     But 


HONOUR   AND   REPUTATION.  251 

to  preach  kindness  to  brutes  as  a  primary  oblij^ation, 
and  capital  point  of  aniendnicnt  in  the  conversion 
of  a  sinner,  is  to  treat  the  symptom  and  leave  un- 
checked the  inward  malady. 

Reading. — St.Thos.,  2a  2se,  q.  25,  art.  3. 


Section  III. — Of  the  right  to  Honour  and  Reputation. 

1.  Honour  is  the  attestation  of  another's  excel- 
lence. Reputation  is  the  opinion  of  many  touching 
another's  life  and  conduct.  Honour  is  paid  to  a 
man  to  his  face,  whereas  his  reputation  is  bruited 
behind  his  back.  Honour  is  taken  away  by  imnlt, 
reputation  by  detraction.  If  the  detraction  involve  a 
falsehood,  it  is  called  calumny  or  slander.  The  name 
backbiting,  given  to  detraction,  points  to  the  absence 
of  the  person  spoken  of.  But  no  one  meets  with 
an  insult  except  where  he  is  present,  either  in  person 
or  by  his  representative. 

2.  Both  honour  and  reputation  are  goods  that 
a  man  can  call  his  own,  and  has  a  right  to,  but  on 
different  titles.  Honour,  some  honour  at  least, 
appertains  to  a  man  simply  for  his  being  a  man : 
reputation  is  won  by  deeds.  Honour  is  primarily  a 
connatural  right :  reputation  is  acquired.  An  entire 
stranger  has  no  reputation,  but  a  certain  honour  is 
his  due  to  start  with. 

3.  As  there  is  a  right  to  honour  and  a  right  to 
reputation,  so  insult  and  detraction  are  sins,  not 
against  charity,  but  against  commutative  justice, 
calling  for  restitution.  {Ethics,  c.  v.,  s.  ix.,  n.  6,  p.  106.) 
We  must  tender  an  apology  for  an  insult,  and  labour 


asa  OF  RIGHTS. 


to  restore  the  good  name  that  our  detracting  tongue 
has  taken  away. 

4.  Calumny  is  a  double  sin,  one  sin  against 
truth,  and  another  sin,  the  heavier  of  the  two, 
against  justice.  If  the  blackening  tale  be  true,  the 
first  sin  is  absent,  but  the  second  is  there.  The 
truth  of  the  story  is  no  justification  for  our  publish- 
ing it.  Though  it  is  wrong  to  lie,  it  is  not  always 
right  to  blurt  out  the  truth,  especially  when  we  are 
not  asked  for  it.  There  are  unprofitable  disclosures, 
unseasonable,  harmful,  and  wrongful.  But,  it  will 
be  said,  does  not  a  man  forego  his  right  to  reputa- 
tion by  doing  the  evil  that  belies  his  fair  fame  ?  No, 
his  right  remains,  unless  the  evil  that  he  does,  either 
of  its  own  proper  working  or  by  the  scandal  that  it 
gives,  be  subversive  of  social  order.  If  he  has  com- 
mitted a  crime  against  society,  he  is  to  be  denounced 
to  the  authorities  who  have  charge  of  society :  they 
will  judge  him,  and,  finding  him  guilty,  they  will 
punish  him  and  brand  him  with  infamy.  If,  again, 
he  does  evil,  though  not  immediately  against  society, 
yet  in  the  face  of  societ}/  and  before  the  sun ;  he 
shocks  the  public  conscience  and  rends  his  own 
reputation.  But  the  evil  private  and  proper  to  him- 
self that  any  man  works  in  secret,  is  not  society's 
care,  nor  affects  his  social  standing,  nor  brings  any 
rightful  diminution  to  his  good  name.  If  all  our 
secret  and  personal  offences  are  liable  to  be  made 
public  by  any  observer,  which  of  us  shall  abide  it? 
Our  character  is  our  public  character;  and  that  is 
not  forfeit  except  for  some  manner  of  public  sin. 
5.  Suppose  a  veteran,  long  retired,  has  made  a 


OF   CONTRACTS.  255 


name  for  military  prowess  by  boasting  of  battles 
wherein  he  never  came  into  danger,  is  the  one  old 
comrade  who  remembers  him  for  a  skulker  and  a 
runaway,  justified  in  showing  him  up  ?  No,  for  that 
reputation,  however  mendaciously  got  together,  is 
still  truly  a  good  possession  :  it  is  not  a  fruit  ol 
injustice,  therefore  it  is  no  matter  of  restitution : 
nor  is  it  any  instrument  of  injustice,  which  the 
holder  is  bound  to  drop  :  thus,  as  he  is  not  bound 
to  forego  it,  now  that  he  has  got  it,  so  his  neigh- 
bour may  not  rightfully  take  it  from  him. 
Reading. — St.  Thos.,  2a  2as,  q.  73,  art.  I. 

Section  IV. — Of  Contracts. 

1.  A  contract  is  a  bargain  productive  of  an  obli« 
gation  of  commutative  justice  in  each  of  the  con- 
tracting parties.  A  bargain  is  a  consent  of  two  wills 
to  the  same  object.  Thus  a  promise,  before  it  is 
accepted,  is  not  a  bargain.  But  even  after  accept- 
ance a  promise  is  not  a  contract,  foi  the  promiser 
may  not  choose  to  bind  himself  in  justice,  but  only 
in  good  faith,  while  the  promisee  is  under  no  obliga- 
tion whatever. 

2.  There  are  such  things  as  implicit  contracts, 
attached  to  the  bearing  of  certain  offices,  whereby  a 
man  becomes  his  brother's  keeper.  The  liability 
contracted  is  limited  by  the  nature  of  the  office : 
thus  a  physician  is  officially  bound  in  justice  as  to 
his  patient's  pulse,  but  not  officially  as  to  his  purse. 
Where  there  is  no  explicit  contract,  the  duties  which 
the  subjects  of  a  person's  official  care  have  towards 
him  are  not  duties  of  commutative  justice.     Thus 


254  OF   RIGHTS. 


these  iDiplicit  contracts  are  not  strictly  contracts,  as 
failing  to  carry  a  full  reciprocity. 

3.  Contracts  are  either  consensual  or  real,  accord- 
ing as  they  are  either  complete  by  the  mere  consent 
of  the  parties,  or  further  require  that  something 
should  change  hands  and  pass  from  one  to  the 
other.  What  contracts  are  consensual,,  and  what 
real,  depends  chieliy  on  positive  law.  No  natural 
law  can  tell  whether  buying  and  selling,  for  instance, 
be  a  consensual  or  a  real  contract.  The  interest  of 
this  particular  case  is  when  the  goods  are  lost  in 
transmission :  then  whichever  of  the  two  parties  at 
the  time  be  determined  to  be  the  owner,  apart  from 
culpable  negligence  or  contrary  agreement  of  the 
sender,  he  bears  the  loss,  on  the  principle,  res  peril 
domino. 

4.  Contracts  are  otherwise  divided  as  onerous 
and  gratuitous.  In  an  onerous  contract  either  party 
renders  some  advantage  in  return  for  the  advantage 
that  he  receives,  as  when  Titius  hires  the  horse  of 
Caius.  In  a  gratuitous  contract  all  the  advantage 
is  on  one  side,  as  when  Titius  does  not  hire  but 
borrows  a  horse.  The  Roman  lawyers  further 
distinguish  contracts,  somewhat  humorously,  into 
contracts  with  names  and  contracts  without  names,  or 
nominate  and  innomitiate,  as  anatomists  name  a 
certain  bone  the  innominate  bone,  and  a  certain 
artery  the  innominate  artery.  Innominate  contracts 
are  reckoned  four :  /  give  on  the  terms  of  your  giving, 
otherwise  than  as  buying  and  selling, — to  some 
forms  of  tliis  there  are  English  names,  as  exchange 
p.nd  barter :  I  do  on  the  terms  of  your  doing :  I  do  on 


OF    USURY.  4  55 


the  terms  of  your  giving:   I  ^ive  on  the  terms  of  your 

doing. 

Readings. — De  Lugo,  De  Just,  et  Jure,  22,  nn.  i,  2, 5, 

6,  g,  16,  17.     For  buying  and  selling  and  the  frauds 

incident  thereto,  Paley,  Moral  Philosophy,  bk.  iii.,  p.  i, 

c.  vii. 

Section  V. — Of  Usury. 

1.  We  must  distinguish  use  value  and  market 
value.  The  use  value  of  an  article  of  property  is  the 
esteem  which  the  owner  has  of  it  from  every  other 
point  of  view  except  as  a  thing  to  sell.  Thus  a 
man  values  his  overcoat  on  a  journey  as  a  protec- 
tion from  cold  and  rain.  A  book  is  valued  that 
was  held  in  the  dying  hand  of  a  parent.  This  is 
use  value.  The  market  value  of  an  article  is  the 
estimate  of  society,  fixing  the  rate  of  exchange 
between  that  and  other  articles,  so  much  of  one  for 
so  much  of  another,  e.g.,  between  mahogany  and 
cedar  wood,  considered  as  things  to  sell. 

2.  Answering  to  this  twofold  value  is  a  twofold 
exchange,  private  exchange,  wdiich  regards  use  value  ; 
and  commercial  exchange,  which  is  founded  on  market 
value.  If  I  part  with  my  watch  to  a  sailor  for 
carrying  me  across  an  arm  of  the  sea  where  there  is 
no  public  ferry,  that  is  private  exchange.  If  I  pay 
the  ordinary  fare  where  there  i3  a  public  ferry,  that 
is  commercial  exchange. 

3.  Private  exchange  begins  in  the  need  of  at 
least  one  of  the  contracting  parties.  It  is  an  act 
of  charity  in  the  other  party  to  accommodate  him 
by  offering  the  thing  needed.  If  the  offer  is  made 
Otherwise  than  as  a  gift,  and  is  accepted,  he  who 


256  OF  RIGHTS. 


avails  himself  of  it  is  bound  in  justice  to  see  that  the 
afforder  of  the  accommodation  is  compensated  for 
the  loss  that  he  suffers  in  affording  it.  Thus  far  the 
recipient  is  bound  in  justice,  and  no  further  in  that 
virtue.  However  wholesome  or  profitable  the  thing 
be  to  him  that  gets  it,  the  supplier  cannot  charge 
for  that  but  only  for  the  loss  that  he  himself  suffers, 
or  the  gain  that  he  foregoes,  in  handing  the  thing 
over,  or  the  pains  that  he  takes,  or  the  hardship 
that  he  endures,  or  the  risk  that  he  runs,  in  ren- 
dering the  service  desired.  If  all  the  labour  to  be 
undergone,  or  damage  incurred,  or  risk  encountered, 
by  the  sailor  who  goes  about  by  private  bargain  to 
be  my  ferryman,  is  fairly  met  by  the  remuneration 
of  a  thirty-shilling  watch,  he  has  no  right  to  stipu- 
late for  any  more,  not  though  the  passage  that  he 
gives  me  sets  me  on  the  way  to  a  throne.  The 
peculiar  advantage  that  I  have  in  prospect  does  not 
come  out  of  him,  but  out  of  myself.  He  must  not 
pretend  to  sell  what  is  not  his,  what  attaches,  not 
to  him,  but  to  me.  He  can  only  sell  his  own  loss, 
risk,  pains  and  labour.  At  the  same  time,  if  I  have 
any  gentlemanly  or  generous  feeling  in  me,  I  shall 
be  forward  to  bestow  extra  remuneration  on  one 
who  has  rendered  me  so  timely  a  service :  but  this 
is  matter  of  my  gratitude,  not  of  his  right  and  claim 
in  justice.  Gratitude  must  not  be  put  into  the  bill. 
And  this  much  of  private  exchange. 

4.  Commercial  exchange  is  conducted  according 
to  market  value.  Apart  from  dire  necessity — and 
one  in  dire  necessity  is  not  fit  to  enter  into  com- 
mercial  exchanges — the   rule  is,  that  a  seller  may 


OJ'    USURY.  257 


alwaj's  ask  the  market  value  of  his  article,  howevci 
much  that  may  be  above  what  the  thinj:^  cost  him, 
or  tlie  use  value  which  it  bears  to  him.  Thus,  if  one 
finds  in  his  garden  a  rare  Roman  coin — so  far  as  his 
tastes  go,  a  paltry  bit  of  metal — he  may  sell  it  for 
whatever  price  numismatists  will  offer :  whereas, 
if  there  were  no  market  for  coins,  but  only  one  indi- 
vidual who  doted  on  such  things,  the  finder  could 
make  no  profit  out  of  that  individual,  the  coin 
having  neither  market  value  with  the  community, 
nor  use  value  in  the  eyes  of  the  finder. 

5.  As  there  is  a  twofold  value,  and  a  twofold 
exchange,  so  a  twofold  character  is  impressed  on 
the  great  instrument  of  exchange,  money.  Money, 
in  one  character,  is  an  instrument  of  private  ex- 
change :  in  its  other  character,  to  mercantile  men 
more  familiar,  it  is  an  instrument  of  commercial 
exchange.  In  the  one,  it  represents  use  value  to  the 
particular  owner,  more  or  less  to  him  than  it  would 
be  to  some  other  owner :  in  the  other,  it  represents 
market  value,  the  same  to  all  at  the  same  time. 

6.  Leo  X.  in  th.e  Fifth  Council  of  Lateran, 
1515,  ruled  that — "usury  is  properly  interpreted  to 
be  the  attempt  to  draw  profit  and  increment,  with- 
out labour,  without  cost,  and  without  risk,  out  of 
the  use  of  a  thing  that  does  not  fructify."  In  1745 
Benedict  XIV.  wrote  in  the  same  sense  to  the 
Bishops  of  Italy:  "That  kind  of  sin  which  is  called 
usury,  and  which  has  its  proper  seat  and  place  in 
the  contract  of  mutunni,  consists  in  turning  that 
contract,  which  of  its  own  nature  requires  the 
amount    returned    exactly   to    balance   the   amount 


«58  OF   RIGHTS. 


received,  into  a  ground  for  demanding  a  return  in 
excess  of  the  amount  received."  Mutmim,  be  it 
observed,  is  a  loan  for  a  definite  period,  of  some 
article,  the  use  of  which  lies  in  its  consumption,  as 
matches,  fuel,  food,  and,  in  one  respect,  money. 
We  shall  prove  this  to  be  properly  a  gratuitous 
contract,  (s.  iv.,  n.  4,  p.  254.) 

7.  Usury  then  is  no  mere  taking  of  exorbitant 
interest.  There  is  no  question  of  more  or  less, 
but  it  is  usury  to  take  any  interest  at  all  upon  the 
loan  of  a  piece  of  property,  which 

{a)  is  of  no  use  except  to  be  used  up,  spent, 
coinsumed  : 

{b)  is  not  wanted  for  the  lender's  own  consump- 
tion within  the  period  of  the  loan  : 

(c)  is  lent  upon  security  that  obviates  risk : 

{d)  is  so  lent  that  the  lender  foregoes  no  occasion 
of  lawful  gain  by  lending  it. 

8.  When  all  these  four  conditions  are  fulfilled, 
and  yet  interest  is  exacted  upon  a  loan,  such  interest 
is  usurious  and  unjust.  And  why?  Simply  by 
reason  of  the  principle  that  we  laid  down  before, 
speaking  of  private  exchange  (n.  3),  a  principle  that 
is  thus  stated  by  St.  Thomas  : 

**  If  one  party  is  much  benefited  by  the  com- 
modity which  he  receives  of  the  other,  while  the 
other,  the  seller,  is  not  a  loser  by  going  without  the 
article,  no  extra  price  must  be  put  on.  The  reason 
is,  because  the  benefit  that  accrues  to  one  party  is 
not  from  the  seller,  but  from  the  condition  of  the 
buyer.  Now  no  one  ought  to  sell  to  another  that 
which  is  not  his,  though  he  may  sell  the  loss  that  he 


OF    USURY.  «5g 


suffers.  He,  however,  who  is  much  benefited  by 
the  commodity  he  receives  of  another,  may  spon- 
taneously bestow  some  extra  recompense  on  the 
seller :  that  is  the  part  of  one  who  has  the  feelings 
of  a  gentleman."  (2a  2ae,  q.  77,  art.  i,  in  corp.) 

g.  St.  Thomas  speaks  of  sales,  but  the  principli? 
apphes  equally  to  loans.  It  is  upon  loans  of  money 
that  interest  is  commonly  taken,  and  of  money-loans 
we  speak.  Clearly,  according  to  the  doctrine  stated, 
the  lender  can  claim  the  compensation  of  interest, 
if  he  has  to  pinch  himself  in  order  to  lend,  or  lends 
at  a  notable  risk.  He  is  selling  his  own  loss, — or 
risk,  which  is  loss  once  removed.  But  supposing  he 
has  other  monies  in  hand,  and  the  security  is  good, 
and  he  has  enough  still  left  for  all  domestic  needs, 
and  for  all  luxuries  that  he  cares  to  indulge  in, — 
moreover  he  has  nothing  absolutely  to  do  with  his 
money,  in  the  event  of  his  not  lending  it,  but  to 
hoard  it  up  in  his  strong  box,  and  wait  long  months 
till  he  has  occasion  to  use  it :  in  that  case,  if  he 
lends  it  he  will  be  no  worse  off  on  the  day  that  he 
gets  it  back,  no  worse  off  in  the  time  while  it  is 
away,  than  if  it  had  never  left  his  coffers.  Such  is 
the  contract  of  mtUuiim,  shorn  of  all  accidental 
attendant  circumstances,  a  contract,  which  "  of  its 
own  nature,"  as  Benedict  XIV.  says,  that  is,  apart 
from  circumstances,  "  requires  the  amount  returned 
exactly  to  balance  the  amount  received."  Not  though 
the  borrower  has  profited  of  the  loan  to  gain  king- 
doms, is  any  further  return  in  strict  justice  to  be 
exacted  of  him  on  that  precise  account. 

10.  But  now  an  altered    case.     Suppose  land  is 


«6o  OF  RIGHTS. 


purchaseable,  and  it  is  proposed  to  stock  a  farm 
with  cattle,  and  rear  them,  and  convey  them  to  a 
large  town  where  there  is  a  brisk  demand  for  meat — 
the  supposition  is  not  always  verified,  nor  any  sup- 
position like  it,  but  suppose  it  verified  in  some  one 
case — then,  though  the  lender  has  other  monies  in 
hand  for  the  needs  of  his  household,  and  the 
security  is  good,  yet  the  money  is  not  so  lent  as 
that  he  foregoes  no  occasion  of  lawful  gain  by 
lending  it.  He  foregoes  the  purchase  of  land  and 
farm  stock,  or  at  least  delays  it,  and  delay  is  loss 
where  profit  is  perennial.  On  that  score  of  gain 
forfeited  he  may  exact  interest  on  the  money  that  he 
lends,  which  interest  will  be  no  usury.  The  title  of 
interest  here  given  is  recognized  by  divines  as 
lucrimi  cessans,  "  interruption  of  profit."  The  interest 
is  taken,  so  far  as  it  goes  upon  a  lawful  title,  not 
upon  the  fact  of  the  borrower's  profit — that  is 
irrelevant — but  upon  the  profit  that  the  lender 
might  have  made,  had  he  kept  the  money  in  hand. 
II.  This  latter  case  (n.  lo)  represents  that  putting 
of  money  out  to  interest,  which  is  an  essential  feature 
of  modern  commerce.  The  former  case  (n.  9)  is  the 
aspect  that  money-lending  commonly  bore  in  the 
Middle  Ages.  In  those  days  land  was  hard  to  buy, 
agriculture  backward,  roads  bad,  seas  unnavigable, 
carrying-trade  precarious,  messages  slow,  raids  and 
marauders  frequent,  population  sparse,  commerce 
confined  to  a  few  centres,  mines  unworked,  manu- 
factures mostly  domestic,  capital  yet  unformed. 
Men  kept  their  money  in  their  cellars,  or  deposited 
it  for  safety  in  religious  houses :  whence  the  storie? 


OF   USURY.  t6l 


of  treasure-trove  belonging  to  those  days.  They 
took  out  the  coin  as  they  wanted  it  to  spend  on 
housekeeping,  or  on  war,  or  feasting.  It  was  very 
hard,  next  to  impossible,  to  lay  out  money  so  as  to 
make  more  money  by  it.  Money  was  in  those  days 
really  barren — a  resource  for  housekeeping,  not  for 
trade — a  medium  of  private,  not  of  commercial  ex- 
change— a  representative  of  use  value,  not  of  market 
value.  Apart  from  risk  of  non-repayment,  to  take 
interest  for  money  that  you  had  no  use  for  but  to 
hoard,  was  getting  **  a  breed  of  barren  metal :  "  it 
was  taking  up  what  you  laid  not  down :  it  was 
making  profit  out  of  your  neighbour's  need,  or  your 
neighbour's  gain,  where  there  was  no  corresponding 
need  unsatisfied,  or  gain  forfeited,  on  your  part :  it 
was  that  "  attempt  to  draw  profit  and  increment, 
without  labour,  without  cost,  and  without  risk,  out 
of  the  use  of  a  thing  that  does  not  fructify,"  which 
the  Fifth  Lateran  Council  defines  to  be  usury. 

12.  In  our  time,  thanks  to  steam  and  electricity, 
the  increase  of  population,  and  continued  peace,  the 
whole  world  has  becoms  one  trading  community, 
representing  now  more,  now  less  abundant  opportu- 
nities for  the  investment  of  money,  and  the  conver- 
sion of  it  into  other  lucrative  commodities.  Money 
consequently  with  us  is  not  a  mere  medium  of 
private  exchange  for  the  purposes  of  housekeeping: 
it  is  a  medium  of  commercial  exchange.  It  repre- 
sents, not  use  value,  but  market  value.  To  be  a 
thousand  pounds  out  of  pocket  for  a  year  means  an 
opportunity  of  gain  irretrievably  lost,  gain  that  co'vld 
have  been  made  otherwise  than  by  money-lciiding. 


262  OF   RIGHTS. 


Where  this  is  so,  and  so  far  as  it  is  so,  the  lender 
may  without  violation  of  justice  point  to  lucrum 
ccssajis,  gain  lost,  and  arrange  beforehand  with  the 
borrower  for  being  reimbursed  with  interest. 

13.  The  transition  from  mediaeval  housekeeping, 
with  its  use  values  and  private  exchange,  to  the 
mercantile  society  of  modern  times,  was  not  made 
in  a  day,  nor  went  on  everywhere  at  the  same  rate. 
It  was  a  growth  of  ages.  In  great  cities  commerce 
rapidly  ripened,  and  was  well  on  towards  maturity 
five  centuries  ago.  Then  the  conditions  that  render 
interest  lawful,  and  mark  it  off  from  usury,  readily 
came  to  obtain.  But  those  centres  were  isolated. 
Like  the  centres  of  ossification,  which  appear  here 
and  there  in  cartilage  when  it  is  being  converted 
into  bone,  they  were  separated  one  from  another  by 
large  tracts  remaining  in  the  primitive  condition. 
Here  you  might  have  a  great  city,  Hamburg  or 
Genoa,  an  early  type  of  commercial  enterprise,  and, 
fifty  miles  inland,  society  was  in  its  infancy,  and  the 
great  city  was  as  part  of  another  world.  Hence  the 
same  transaction,  as  described  by  the  letter  of  the 
law,  might  mean  lawful  interest  in  the  city,  and 
usury  out  in  the  country — the  two  were  so  discon- 
nected. In  such  a  situation  the  legislator  has  to 
choose  between  forbidding  interest  here  and  allowing 
usury  there ;  between  restraining  speculation  and 
licensing  oppression.  The  mediaeval  legislator  chose 
the  former  alternative.  Church  and  State  together 
enacted  a  number  of  laws  to  restrain  the  taking  of 
interest,  laws  that,  like  the  clothes  of  infancy,  are 
not   to    be    scorned    as   absurd    restrictions,  merely 


LVSTITUTION  OF  MARRIAGE.  263 

because  they  are  inapplicable  now,  and  would  not 
fit  the  modern  growth  of  nations.  At  this  day  the 
State  has  repealed  those  laws,  and  the  Church  has 
officially  signified  that  she  no  longer  insists  on  them. 
Still  she  maintains  dogmatically  that  there  is  such 
a  sin  as  usur}-,  and  what  it  is,  as  defmed  in  the 
Fifth  Council  of  Lateran. 

Readings. — St.  Thos.,  2a  23e,  q.  yy,  art.  i ;  Ar., 
Pol.,  I.,  ix. ;  St.  Thos.,  2a  2ae,  q.  77,  art.  4  ;  The  Month 
for  September,  1886 ;  The  Nineteenth  Century  for 
September,  1S77,  PP*  ^S^»  ^cq. 


CHAPTER   VI. 

OF    MARRIAGE. 

Section,  I — Of  the  Institution  of  Marriage. 

I.  Marriage  is  defined  by  the  Canonists :  the  union 
of  male  and  female,  involving  their  living  together  in 
undivided  intercourse.  In  the  present  order  of  Provi- 
dence, the  marriage  contract  between  baptized 
persons  is  a  sacrament,  under  the  superintendence 
of  the  Church,  the  fertile  theme  of  canonists  and 
theologians.  As  philosophers,  we  deal  with  marriage 
as  it  would  be,  were  there  no  sacraments,  no  Church, 
and  no  Incarnation,  present  or  to  come.  This  is 
marriage  in  the  order  of  pure  nature. 

2.  It  is  natural  to  all  animals  to  propagate  their 
kind,  natural  therefore  also  to  man ;  and  being 
natural,  it  is  so  far  forth  also  a  good  thing,  unless 


264  OF   MARRIAGE. 


we  are  to  say  with  the  Manicheans,  that  the  whole 
of  corporeal  nature  is  an  evil  creation.  Nay,  so 
urgent  is  the  natural  appetite  here,  that  we  must 
argue  the  existence,  not  of  a  mere  permission,  but  of 
an  exigency  of  nature,  and  consequent  command  of 
God  {Ethics,  c,  vi.,  s.  ii.,  nn.  11, 12,  p.  122),  for  the  pro- 
pagation of  the  human  species.  Besides,  there  is  in 
the  individual  the  duty  of  self-preservation,  therefore 
likewise  in  the  race.  Again,  the  old  cannot  subsist 
at  all  without  the  support  of  the  young,  nor  lead  a 
cheerful  existence  without  their  company.  Imagine 
a  world  with  no  youth  in  it,  a  winter  without  a 
spring ! 

3.  There  is  this  difference  between  self-preserva- 
tion and  the  preservation  of  the  race,  that  if  a  man 
will  not  eat,  none  can  eat  for  him  ;  but  if  one  man 
omit  the  propagation  of  his  kind,  another  can  take 
it  up.  There  are  many  things  necessary  for  the 
good  of  mankind,  which  are  not  to  be  done  by  every 
individual.  Not  all  are  to  be  soldiers,  nor  all  builders, 
though  houses  are  needful,  and  sometimes  war.  Nor 
is  it  desirable  that  the  human  race  should  be  m.ulti- 
plied  to  its  utmost  capacity.  It  is  enough  here  to 
mention  without  discussing  the  teaching  of  Malthus, 
how  population  presses  on  the  means  of  subsistence, 
the  latter  increasing  in  an  arithmetical,  the  former 
in  a  geometrical  ratio.  Without  going  the  whole 
way  with  Malthus,  modern  economical  writers  are 
commonly  a  little  Malthusian,  and  shrink  from  giving 
to  all  and  each  of  their  species  the  word  to  **  increase 
snd  multiply." 

4.  BuL",  it  will   be  said,  sickly  and    consumptive 


INSTITUTION   OF  MARRIAGE. 


265 


subjects,  and  still  more  those  who  have  any  tendency 
to  madness,  may  well  be  excused  from  having 
children ;  so  too  may  they  be  excused  whose  poverty 
cannot  keep  a  family ;  excused  too  is  the  inveterate 
drunkard,  and  all  habitual  criminals,  by  the  principle 
of  heredity,  lest  they  transmit  to  posterity  an  evil 
bodily  predisposition ;  but  the  healthy  and  the 
virtuous,  men  sound  of  mind  and  limb,  of  life  un- 
spotted, and  in  circumstances  easy,  the  flower  of 
the  race, — none  of  these  surely  should  omit  to  raise 
up  others  to  wear  his  lineaments :  we  want  such 
men  multiplied.  I  answer,  on  natural  grounds 
alone :  You  may  counsel,  but  you  cannot  compel, 
either  by  positive  law  or  ethical  precept,  any  man 
or  woman  to  seek  to  have  children.  You  surely  will 
not  breed  men  by  selection,  like  cattle,  as  Plato 
proposed.  The  union  of  the  sexes,  especially  the 
married  union,  is  an,  act  to  be  of  all  others  the  most 
entirely  free,  spontaneous,  uncommanded,  and  un- 
constrained. It  should  be  a  union  of  intense  mutual 
love.  But  a  man  may  not  meet  with  any  woman 
that  he  can  love  with  passion ;  or,  meeting  such,  he 
may  not  be  able  to  win  her.  Nor,  considering  the 
indeterminateness  of  points  of  health,  capacity,  and 
character,  could  any  certain  list  be  drawn  up  of 
persons  bound  to  have  issue.  Thus  the  utmost  that 
can  be  argued  is  a  counsel  in  this  direction,  a  counsel 
that  mankind  ordinarily  are  ready  enough  to  comply 
with.  But  if  any  one  of  seeming  aptitude  excuses 
himself  on  the  score  of  finding  no  partner  to  his 
liking,  or  of  a  desire  to  travel,  or  of  study,  or  still 
more,  of  devotion — and  why  should  not  a  man,  even 


266  OF  MARRIAGE. 


of  natural  piety,  go  out  into  solitude,  like  St.  Antony, 
to  hold  communion  with  his  Maker  ? — all  these 
excuses  must  be  taken.  It  is  lawful  then  in  the 
state  of  mere  nature,  upon  any  one  of  many  sufficient 
grounds,  to  stand  aside  and  relinquish  to  your  neigh- 
bour the  privilege  and  responsibility  of  giving  in- 
crease to  the  human  family. 

5.  But  if  it  is  no  one  individual's  duty  to  propa- 
gate his  kind,  how  is  it  that  we  have  laid  down  that 
there  is  such  a  duty  ?  For  the  duty  is  incumbent 
upon  them  that  alone  can  do  it,  and  it  can  only  he 
done  by  individuals.  The  answer  rests  on  a  dis- 
tinction between  proximate  and  remote  duty.  The 
propagation  of  the  race  is  the  remote  duty  of  every 
individual,  but  at  present  the  proximate  duty  of 
none.  A  remote  duty  is  a  duty  not  now  pressing 
but  which  would  have  to  be  performed  in  a  certain 
contingency,  which  contingency  happening,  the  duty 
becomes  proximate.  If  there  appeared  a  danger  of 
our  race  dying  out,  the  survivors  would  be  beholden, 
especially  those  in  power,  to  take  steps  for  its  con- 
tinuance. Rewards  might  then  be  held  out,  like  the 
jus  trium  liherorum  instituted  at  Rome  by  Augustus  ; 
and  if  necessary,  penalties  inflicted  on  celibacy.  In 
this  one  extreme  case  the  matrimonial  union  might 
be  made  matter  of  legal  constraint.  But  when  will 
such  constraint  become  necessary  ? 

6.  The  continuance  of  the  human  race  must  be 
wrought  out  by  man  and  woman  standing  in  that 
abiding  and  exclusive  relation  to  one  another,  which 
constitutes  the  state  of  marriage.  Nature  abhors 
promiscuity,  or  free  love.     It  is  the  delight  of  writers 


INSTITUTION   OF   MARRIAGE.  267 

who  use,  perhaps  abuse,  Darwin's  name,  to  picture 
primitive  mankind  as  all  living  in  this  infrabestial 
state.  But  "the  state  supposed  is  suicidal,  and 
instead  of  allowing  the  expansion  of  the  human  race, 
would  have  produced  infertility,  and  probably  dis- 
ease, and  at  best  only  allowed  the  existing  numbers 
to  maintain,  under  the  most  favourable  circum- 
stances, a  precarious  existence.  To  suppose,  there- 
fore, that  the  whole  human  race  for  any  considerable 
time  were  without  regular  marriage,  is  physiologically 
impossible.  They  could  never  have  survived  it.' 
(Devas,  Studies  of  Family  Life,  §  loi.) 

7.  Even  if  the  alleged  promiscuity  ever  did 
prevail — and  it  may  have  obtained  to  some  extent 
in  certain  degraded  portions  of  humanity — its  preva- 
lence was  not  its  justification.  The  practice  cannot 
have  been  befitting  in  any  stage  of  the  evolution  of 
human  society.  As  in  all  things  we  suppose  our 
readers  to  have  understanding,  we  leave  it  to  them 
to  think  out  this  matter  for  themselves.  Suffice  it 
here  to  put  forward  two  grand  advantages  gained 
and  ends  achieved,  which  are  called  by  theologians 
"  the  goods  of  marriage." 

8.  The  first  good  of  marriage  is  the  offspring  that 
is  born  of  it.  Nature  wills,  not  only  the  being,  but 
the  well-being  of  this  offspring,  and  that  both  in  the 
physical  and  in  the  moral  order.  Very  important 
for  the  physical  health  of  the  child  it  is,  that  it  be 
born  of  parents  whose  animal  propensities  are  under 
some  restraint ;  such  restraint  the  bond  of  marriage 
implies.  Then,  in  the  moral  order,  the  child  requires 
to  be  educated  with  love,  a  love  that  shall  be  guided 


268  OF  MARRIAGE. 


by  wisdom,  and  supported  by  firmness.  Love, 
wisdom,  and  firmness,  they  are  the  attributes  of 
both  parents ;  but  love  is  especially  looked  for  from 
the  mother,  wisdom  and  firmness  from  the  father. 
And,  what  is  important,  both  have  an  interest  in  the 
child  such  as  no  other  human  being  can  take.  We 
are  speaking  of  the  normal  father  or  mother,  not  of 
many  worthless  parents  that  actually  are ;  for,  as 
Aristotle  often  lays  it  down,  we  must  not  judge  of  a 
thing  from  its  bad  specimens.  No  doubt,  the  State 
could  establish  public  nurseries  and  infant  schools, 
and  provide  a  staff  of  nurses  and  governesses,  more 
scientific  educators  than  even  the  normal  parent ; 
but  who,  that  has  not  been  most  unhappy  in  his 
origin,  would  wish  his  own  infancy  to  have  been 
reared  in  such  a  place  ?  What  certificated  stranger 
can  supply  for  a  mother's  love  ? 

9.  The  second  good  of  marriage  is  the  mutual 
faith  of  the  partners.  Plato  never  made  a  greater 
mistake  than  when  he  wrote  that  "  the  female  sex 
differs  from  the  male  in  mankind  only  in  this,  that 
the  one  bears  children,  while  the  other  begets  them ; " 
and  consequently  that  "no  occupation  of  social  life 
belongs  to  a  woman  because  she  is  a  woman,  or  to 
a  man  because  he  is  a  man,  but  capacities  are  equally 
distributed  in  both  sexes,  and  woman  naturally  bears 
her  share  in  all  occupations,  and  man  his  share,  only 
that  in  all  woman  is  weaker  than  man."  {Republic, 
454  D ;  455  D.)  Over  against  this  we  must  set 
Aristotle's  correction  :  "  Cohabitation  among  human 
kind  is  not  for  the  mere  raising  of  children,  but  also 
for  the  purposes  of  a  partnership  in  life:  for  from  the 


INSTITUTION    OF  MARRIAGE.  2bo 

first  the  offices  of  man  and  woman  are  distinct  and 
different :  thus  they  mutually  supply  for  one  another, 
puttin;^  their  several  advantac^es  into  the  common 
stock."  (Ar.,  Eth.,  VIII.,  xii.  7.)  Elsewhere  he  sets 
forth  these  several  offices  in  detail:  "The  nature 
of  both  partners,  man  and  woman,  has  been  pre- 
arranged by  a  divine  dispensation  in  view  of  their 
partnership:  for  they  differ  by  not  having  their  facul- 
ties available  all  to  the  same  effect,  but  some  even  to 
opposite  effects,  though  combining  to  a  common  end  : 
for  God  made  the  one  sex  stronger  and  the  other 
weaker,  that  the  one  for  fear  may  be  the  more  careful, 
and  the  other  for  courage  the  more  capable  of  self- 
defence  ;  and  that  the  one  may  forage  abroad,  while 
the  other  keeps  house:  and  for  work  the  one  is  made 
competent  for  sedentary  employments,  but  too 
delicate  for  an  out-door  life,  while  the  other  makes 
a  poor  figure  at  keeping  still,  but  is  vigorous  and 
robust  in  movement ;  and  touching  children,  the 
generation  is  special,  but  the  improvement  of  the 
children  is  the  joint  labour  of  both  parents,  for 
it  belongs  to  the  one  to  nurture,  to  the  other  to 
chastise."  (Ar.,  Econ.,  i.  3.) 

These  passages  are  enough  to  suggest  more  than 
they  actually  contain,  of  two  orders  of  qualities 
arranged  antithetically  one  over  against  another  in 
man  and  woman,  so  that  the  one  existence  becomes 
complementary  to  the  other,  and  the  two  conjoined 
form  one  perfect  human  life.  This  life-communion, 
called  by  divines  fides,  or  mutual  faith,  is  then  the 
second  gcod  fruit  of  marriage.  Indeed  it  is  the  more 
characteristically  human  good,  offspring  being  rather 


370  OF  MARRIAGE. 


related  to  the  animal  side  of  our  nature.  But  as 
animal  and  rational  elements  make  one  human 
being,  so  do  offspring  and  mutual  faith  constitute  the 
adequate  good  of  that  human  union  of  the  sexes, 
which  we  call  marriage. 

10.  Whatever  good  there  is  in  marriage,  connec- 
tions formed  by  either  party  beyond  the  marriage- 
bed,  are  agents  of  confusion  to  the  undoing  of  all 
that  good  and  the  practical  dissolution  of  the 
marriage. 

Readings. — Contra  Gcnics,  iii.,  122;  ih.,  iii.,  126; 
ih.,  iii.,  136;  Devas,  Studies  of  Family  Life,  §§  go — loi, 
where  he  disposes  of  the  proof  of  primitive  pro- 
miscuity, drawn  from  the  fact  that  in  early  societies 
kinship  is  traced  and  property  claimed  only  through 
the  mother. 

Section  II. — Of  the  Unity  of  Marriage. 

1.  Both  man  and  woman  are  by  nature  incapable  of  a 
second  marriage,  while  their  former  marriage  endures. 
No  w^oman  can  have  two  husbands  at  the  same  time, 
which  is  polyandry  ;  and  no  man  can  have  two  wives 
at  the  same  time,  which  is  polygamy.  The  second 
marriage  attempted  is  not  only  illicit,  but  invalid : 
it  is  no  contract,  no  marriage  at  all,  and  all  cohabita- 
tion with  the  second  partner  is  sheer  adultery.  This 
is  a  great  deal  more  than  saying  that  polyandry  and 
polygamy  are  unlawful. 

2.  That  is  by  nature  no  marriage,  which  is  in- 
consistent with  the  natural  ends  of  marriage,  offspring 
and  mutual  faith.  But  polyandry  is  thus  inconsistent 
with  the  good  of  offspring,  and  polygamy  with  mutual 


UNITY  OF   MARRIAGE.  aji 

faith.  It  is  not  meant  that  polyandry  makes  the 
birth  of  children  impossible.  But  nature  is  solicitous, 
not  for  the  mere  birth,  but  for  the  rearin;,'  and  good 
estate  of  the  child  born.  Now  a  child  born  father- 
less is  in  an  ill  plight  for  its  future  education. 
Posthumous  children  in  lawful  wedlock  are  born 
fatherless :  that  is  a  calamity :  but  what  shall  we 
think  of  an  institution  which  makes  that  calamity  to 
the  child  sure  always  to  occur  ?  Such  an  institution 
is  polyandry.  For  in  it  no  man  can  ever  know  his 
own  child,  except  by  likeness,  and  likeness  in  a  baby 
face  is  largely  as  you  choose  to  fancy  it.  Again,  is 
the  polyandrous  wife  to  be,  or  not  to  be,  the  head  of 
the  family  ?  If  not,  the  family — for  it  ought  to  be 
one  family,  where  there  is  one  mother — will  have  as 
many  heads  as  she  has  husbands,  a  pretty  specimen 
of  a  house  divided  against  itself.  If  she  is  to  be 
the  head,  that  is  a  perversion  of  the  natural  order 
of  predominance  between  the  sexes.  In  any  case, 
polyandry  is  little  better  than  promiscuity :  it  is  fatal 
to  the  family  and  fatal  to  the  race ;  and  children 
born  of  it  are  born  out  of  marriage. 

3.  Against  polygamy  the  case  in  naturallaw  is 
not  quite  so  strong  as  against  polyandry.  Still  it  is 
a  strong  case  enough  in  the  interest  of  the  wife.  The 
words  spoken  by  the  bride  to  the  bridegroom  in  the 
marriage  rite  of  ancient  Rome,  Ubi  tu  Cuius,  ego 
Caia,  "  Where  you  are  master,  I  am  mistress," 
declare  the  relation  of  mutual  faiih  as  it  should  be, 
namely,  a  relation  of  equality,  with  some  advantage, 
preference,  and  pre-eminence  allowed  to  the  hus- 
band, yet   not   so  great  advantage  as  to  leave  him 


272  OF  MARRIAGE. 


free  where  she  is  straitly  bound,  and  reduce  her  to 
the  servile  level  of  one  in  a  row  of  minions  to 
his  passion  and  sharers  of  his  divided  affections. 
Polygamy  in  all  ages  has  meant  the  lowering  of 
womankind  ; 

He  will  hold  thee — 

Something  better  than  his  dog,  a  little  dearer  than  his  horss 

At  its  strongest,  the  love  of  man  for  woman, 
where  polygamy  obtains,  is  a  flame  of  passion,  thai 
quickly  spends  itself  on  one  object,  and  then  passes 
to  another;  not  a  rational,  enduring,  human  affection. 
It  is  also  a  fact,  that  the  increase  of  the  race  is  not 
greater  in  polygamy  than  in  monogamy.  Thus,  as 
a  practice  that  runs  strongly  counter  to  one  of  the 
great  purposes  of  marriage,  and  is,  to  say  the  least, 
no  help  to  the  other,  and  carries  with  it  the 
humiliation  of  the  female  sex,  polygamy  is  justly 
argued  to  be  abhorrent  to  nature. 

4.  It  is  beside  the  purpose  of  this  work  to  enter 
into  the  questions  of  morality  that  arise  out  of  Holy 
Scripture,  considered  as  an  inspired  record  of  the 
actions  of  the  Saints.  But  the  polygamy  of  the 
patriarchs  of  old  so  readily  occurs  to  mind,  that  it 
is  worth  while  to  mention  four  conceivable  explana- 
tions, if  only  to  indicate  which  is  and  which  is  not 
reconcilable  with  our  philosophy.  The  first  explana- 
tion would  be,  that  polygamy  is  not  against  the 
natural  law,  but  only  against  the  positive  divine  law, 
which  was  derogated  from  in  this  instance.  We 
have  made  it  out  to  be  against  the  natural  law.  The 
second    explanation   would   be   that   God   gave  the 


UNITY  OF  MARRIAGE.  273 

patriarchs  a  dispensation,  strictly  so  called,  from 
this  point  of  the  natural  law.  We  have  maintained 
that  God  cannot,  strictly  speaking,  dispense  from 
one  jot  or  tittle  of  natural  law.  (Ethics,  c.  viii.,  s.  iii., 
nn.  I — 3,  p.  147-)^  A  third  explanation  would  be 
founded  on  the  words  of  St.  Paul  to  the  Athenians 
(Acts  xvii.  30),  about  "  God  overlooking  the  times  of 
this  ignorance."  This  would  suppose  that  mankind, 
beginning  in  monogamy,  from  passion  and  ignorance 
lapsed  quickly  into  polygamy :  that  the  patriarchs 
in  good  faith  conformed  to  the  practice  of  their  time ; 
and  that  God,  in  their  case  as  with  the  rest  of  man- 
kind, awaited  His  own  destined  hour  for  the  light  of 
better  knowledge  to  break  upon  the  earth.  A  fourth 
explanation  would  be  this.  God  by  His  supreme 
dominion  can  dissolve  any  marriage.  By  the  same 
dominative  power  He  can  infringe  and  partially 
make  void  any  marriage  contract  without  entirely 
undoing  it.  The  marriage  contract,  existing  in  its 
fulness  and  integrity,  is  a  bar  to  any  second  similar 
contract,  as  we  have  proved.  But  what,  on  this 
theory,  the  Lord  God  did  with  the  marriages  of  the 
patriarchs  was  this  :  He  partially  unravelled  and 
undid  the  contract,  so  as  to  leave  room  for  a 
second  contract,  and  a  third,  each  having  the  bare 
essentials  of  a  marriage,  but  none  of  them  the  full 
integrity. 

1  Dispensatio  is  the  Latin  for  oiKovouia,  and  in  this  case  means  an 
'  economy  '  of  law,  in  the  sense  that  God  did  not  press  the  marriage 
law  beyond  the  capacity  of  the  subject  (Matt.  xix.  7,8).  See  my 
Newman  Index,  s.v.  Economy.  The  schoolmen  missed  this  mean- 
ing', and  took  dispensatio  in  the  canonical  sense. 

S 


274  OF  MARRIAGE. 


But,  for  the  author's  final  view,  see  Appendix. 

Rcndiui^'i. — Contra    Gent.,    ill.,    124 ;    Suarez,    De 
Legibns,  II.,  xv.,  28. 


S RCTiON   1 1 1 . — Of  the  Indissohhility  of  Marriage. 

I.  This  section  is  pointed  not  so  much  against  a 
separation — which  may  take  place  by  mutual  consent, 
or  without  that,  by  grievous  infidehty  or  cruelty  of 
one  party — as  against  a  divorce  a  vinculo,  which  is 
a  dissolution  of  a  marriage  in  the  lifetime  of  the 
parties,  enabling  each  of  them  validly  and  lawfully 
to  contract  with  some  other.  The  unity  of  marriage 
is  more  essential  than  its  indissolubility.  Nature  is 
more  against  polygamy  than  against  divorce.  Even 
Henry  VIII.  stuck  at  polygamy.  In  the  present 
arrangement,  a  divorce  a  vinculo  is  obtainable  in 
three  cases.  First,  when  of  two  unbaptized  persons, 
man  and  wife,  the  one  is  converted,  and  the  uncon- 
verted party  refuses  to  live  peaceably  in  wedlock,  the 
convert  may  marry  again,  and  thereupon  also  the 
other  party.  So  the  Church  understands  St.  Paul, 
I  Cor.  vii.  13,  15.  Again,  the  Pope  can  grant  a 
divorce  a  vinculo  in  the  marriage  of  baptized  persons 
before  cohabitation.  Such  a  marriage  in  that  stage 
is  also  dissolved  by  the  profession  of  one  of  the 
parties  in  a  religious  order.  Beyond  these  three 
cases,  the  Catholic  Church  allows  neither  the  lawful- 
ness nor  the  validity  of  any  divorce  a  vinculo  by 
whomsoever  given  to  whatsoever  parties. 


INDISSOLUBILITY  OF   MARRIAGE.  275 

2.  It  is  ours  to  investigate  the  lie  of  the  law  of 
nature,  having  due  regard  to  the  points  marked, 
antecedently  to  our  search,  by  the  definition  of  in- 
fallible authority.  Nothing  can  be  done  in  the 
Church  against  the  law  of  nature  :  since  therefore 
divorce  a  vinculo  is  sometimes  recognized  in  the 
Church,  it  may  be  contended  that  marriage  is  not 
by  nature  absolutely  indissoluble.  On  the  other 
hand,  it  is  a  proposition  censured  by  Pius  IX.  in  the 
Syllabus,  n.  67  :  "  By  the  law  of  nature  the  bond  of 
marriage  is  not  indissoluble."  Thus  it  appears  we 
must  teach  that  marriage  is  naturally  indissoluble, 
still  not  absolutely  so,  just  as  a  safe  is  justly  ad- 
vertised as  fire-proof,  when  it  will  resist  any  con- 
flagration that  is  likely  to  occur,  though  it  would  be 
consumed  in  a  blast-furnace  or  in  a  volcano.  So 
mK.rriage  is  indissoluble,  if  it  holds  good  for  all 
ordinary  contingencies,  for  all  difficulties  that  may 
be  fairly  reckoned  with  and  regarded  as  not  quite 
improbable,  for  every  posture  of  affairs  that  the  con- 
tracting parties  before  their  union  need  at  all  consider. 
Or,  if  the  three  cases  of  divorce  actually  allowed  are 
to  be  traced  to  the  dominative  power  of  God  {Ethics, 
c.  vii.,  n.  2,  p.  129),  we  may  teach  that  marriage  is 
by  nature  absolutely  indissoluble,  and  that  divorce 
is  as  much  against  the  law  of  nature  as  the  killing  of 
an  innocent  man,  excepting  in  the  case  of  God's 
dominion  being  employed  to  quash  the  contract  or 
the  right  to  life.  But  against  this  latter  view  is  to 
be  set  the  consideration,  that  God  is  manifestly 
averse  to  using  His  dominative  power  to  overturn 
natural  ordinances.     He  does  not  hand  the  innocent 


276  OF  MARRIAGE. 


over  to  death  except  in  the  due  course  of  physical 
nature :  why  then  should  He  ever  put  forth  His 
power  against  the  marriage-tie,  unless  it  be  that 
nature  herself  in  certain  cases  postulates  its  sever- 
ance ?  But  if  such  is  ever  nature's  petition,  the 
universal  and  unconditional  permanence  of  the 
marriage-tie  cannot  be  a  requisition  of  nature,  nor 
is  divorce  absolutely  excluded  by  natural  law. 

3.  Thomas  Sanchez,  than  whom  there  is  no 
greater  authority  on  this  subject,  records  his  opinion 
that  "  a  certain  inseparability  is  of  the  nature  of 
marriage,"  but  that  "absolute  indissolubility  does 
not  attach  to  marriage  by  the  law  of  nature."  He 
adds  :  "  if  we  consider  marriage  as  it  is  an  office  of 
nature  for  the  propagation  of  the  race,  it  is  hard  to 
render  a  reason  why  for  the  wife's  barrenness  the 
husband  should  not  be  allowed  to  put  her  away,  or 
marry  another."  {De  Mairimonio,  1.  ii.,  d.  13,  n.  7.) 
We  proceed  to  prove  that  "  a  certain  inseparability 
is  of  the  nature  of  marriage,"  so  that  marriage  may 
truly  be  said  to  be  indissoluble  by  the  law  of  nature. 
Whether  this  natural  indissolubility  is  absolute,  and 
holds  for  every  conceivable  contingency,  the  student 
must  judge  by  the  proofs. 

4.  If  a  divorce  a  vinculo  were  a  visible  object 
on  the  matrimonial  horizon,  the  parties  would  be 
strongly  encouraged  thereby  to  form  illicit  con- 
nections, in  the  expectation  of  shortly  having  any 
one  of  them  they  chose  ratified  and  sanctified  by 
marriage.  Marriage  would  be  entered  upon  lightl}', 
as  a  thing  easily  done  and  readily  undone,  a  state 
of  things  not  very  far  in  advance  of  promiscuity. 


INDISSOLUBILITY   OF  MARRIAGE.  277 

Between  married  persons  little  wounds  would  fester, 
trifling  sores  would  be  angered  into  ulcers:  any 
petty  strife  might  lead  to  a  fresh  contract,  made  in 
haste  and  repented  of  with  speed  :  then  fond,  vain 
regrets  for  the  former  partnership.  Aflinity  would 
be  a  loose  bond  of  friendship  between  families;  and 
after  divorce  it  would  turn  to  enmity.  The  fair  but 
weaker  sex  would  suffer  the  more  by  this  as  by  all 
other  matrimonial  perversions :  for  the  man  has  not 
so  much  difficulty  in  lighting  upon  another  love,  but 
the  woman — she  illustrates  the  Greek  proverb  of 
a  fallen  estate : 

Mighty  was  Miletus  in  the  bygone  days  of  yore. 

The  divorced  wife  offers  fewer  attractions  than  the 
widow. 

5.  It  is  well  to  bear  in  mind  that,  at  least  by 
the  positive  ordinance  of  God  in  the  present  order 
of  His  Providence,  the  marriage  of  baptized  persons, 
after  cohabitation,  is  absolutely  indissoluble;  and 
no  marriage  can  be  dissolved  except  in  the  three 
cases  specified,  (n.  i.) 

Readings. — Leo  XIII.,  Encyclical  on  Christian 
Marriage,  Arcanum  divince  sapiciUia: ;  St.  Thomas, 
Contra  Gent.^  iii.,  123. 


CHAPTER   Vli. 

OF    PROPERTY. 

Section  I. — Of  Pvivate  Property, 

I.  Property  was  called  by  the  Romans  res  fami- 
liaris,  the  stuff  and  substance  of  the  family. 
Property  may  be  held  by  the  individual  for  himself 
alone  :  but  any  large  accumulation  of  it  is  commonly 
held  by  the  head  of  a  family,  actual  or  potential, 
for  the  family ;  and  he  cherishes  it  for  the  sake  of 
his  family  as  much  as,  or  even  more  than,  for  his 
own  sake.  This  is  to  be  borne  in  mind,  for  many 
errors  in  theory  and  in  practice  spring  from  a  large 
proprietor  figuring  as  an  individual,  and  not  as  a 
sort  of  corporation  sole  in  his  capacity  of  pater- 
familias. 

2.  We  have  seen  (c.  v.,  s.  i.,  n.  2,  p.  245)  how 
man  acquires  a  right  over  external  goods,  as  it  were 
setting  the  seal  of  his  own  personality  upon  them. 
It  appears  upon  further  consideration,  that  this 
right  must  extend  beyond  the  mere  making  things 
your  own  for  immediate  use  and  consumption ;  it 
must  extend  to  the  storing  of  things  for  future  and 
perennial  use.  Otherwise  we  have  Communism. 
Communism  allows  men  to  hold  property  col- 
lectively in  a  common  stock,  and  allows  each 
member  of  the  community  to  take  for  his  peculiar 


PRIVATE   PROPERTY.  279 

own  out  of  that  stock  whatever  for  the  moment  he 
needs;  but  it  will  not  permit  him  to  aj)propriate 
private  means  of  subsistence  against  any  notable 
time  to  come.  Communism  is  very  good  in  a  family, 
which  is  an  imperfect  community,  part  of  a  higher 
community,  the  State.  It  is  very  good  in  a 
monastery,  which  is  like  a  family:  again,  very 
good  in  the  primitive  Church  at  Jerusalem,  which 
existed  for  the  time  on  quasi-monastic  lines :  very 
good  even  in  a  perfect  community,  if  such  there  be, 
of  tropical  savages,  for  whom  nature  supplies  all 
things,  bananas  to  eat  and  palm-leaves  to  wear, 
without  any  human  labour  of  production ;  but 
very  bad  and  quite  unworkable  everywhere  else. 
St.  Thomas,  following  Aristotle,  puts  it  pithily 
and  sufficiently :  "  Private  property  is  necessary  to 
human  life  for  three  reasons:  first,  because  every 
one  is  more  careful  to  look  after  what  belongs  to 
himself  alone  than  after  what  is  common  to  all  or  to 
many,  since  all  men  shun  labour  and  leave  to  others 
what  is  matter  of  joint  concern,  as  happens  where 
there  are  too  many  servants :  on  another  ground, 
because  human  affairs  are  more  orderly  handled, 
if  on  each  individual  there  rests  his  own  care 
of  managing  something,  whereas  there  would  be 
nothing  but  confusion,  if  every  one  without  dis- 
tinction were  to  have  the  disposal  of  any  thing 
he  chose  to  take  in  hand  :  thirdly,  because  by  this 
means  society  is  the  rather  kept  at  peace,  every 
member  being  content  with  his  own  possession, 
whence  we  see  that  among  those  who  hold  any 
thing  in  common  and  undivided  ownership  strifes 


480  OF  PROPERTY. 


not  unfrequeiitly  arise."   (2a   23e,   q.   66,   art.   2,   in 
Corp.) 

3.  If  any  revolutionist  yet  will  have  the  hardi- 
hood to  say  with  Proudhon,  **  Property  is  theft,"  we 
shall  ask  him,  "  From  whom  ?  "  He  will  answer  of 
course,  "  From  the  community."  But  that  answer 
supposes  the  community  to  have  flourished,  a 
wealthy  corporation,  before  private  property  began, 
l^^eedless  to  say  that  history  knows  nothing  of  such 
a  corporation.  The  saying,  that  in  the  beginning  all 
things  were  in  cominon,  is  not  true  in  the  sense  that 
they  were  positively  in  common,  like  the  goods  of 
a  corporation,  which  are  collective  property :  but 
simply  that  they  were  negatively  in  common,  that 
is,  not  property  at  all,  neither  of  corporation  nor  of 
individual,  but  left  in  the  middle  open  to  all  comers, 
for  each  to  convert  into  property  by  his  occupation, 
and  by  his  labour  to  enhance  and  multiply.  This 
must  be  modified  by  the  observation,  that  the  first 
occupants  were  frequently  heads  of  families,  or  of 
small  clans,  and  occupied  and  held  for  themselves 
and  their  people. 

4.  The  saying,  that  all  things  are  in  common  by  the 
law  of  nature,  must  be  received  with  still  greater 
reserve.  Really  with  as  much  truth  it  might  be  said 
that  all  men  are  unmarried,  or  unclad,  or  uneducated, 
by  the  law  of  nature.  Nature  unaided  b}'  human 
volition  provides  neither  property,  nor  clothing,  nor 
marriage,  nor  education,  for  man.  But  nature  bids, 
urges  and  requires  man  to  bestir  his  voluntary 
energies  for  the  securing  of  all  these  things.  The 
law    of    nature     does    not     prescribe     this    or   that 


PRIVATE  PROPERTY.  281 

particular  distribution  of  goods,  as  neither  does  it 
join  this  man  with  that  woman  in  marriage,  nor 
insist  on  plaids  rather  than  coats,  nor  set  all  boys 
to  learn  algebra,  nor  fix  a  ritual  for  divine  worship; 
but  it  insists  in  the  vague  upon  some  worship,  some 
education,  some  clothing,  some  marriage,  and  some 
distribution  of  goods,  leaving  the  determination  in 
each  case  to  choice,  custom,  and  positive  law, 
human  and  divine. 

5.  All  property  that  can  ever  be  immediately 
serviceable  for  saving  human  life,  is  held  under  this 
burden,  that  a  perishing  fellow-creature,  who  cannot 
otherwise  help  himself  in  a  case  of  extreme  need  (c.  iv,, 
n.  8,  p.  243),  may  make  such  use  of  the  property  of 
another  as  shall  suffice  to  rescue  him  from  perishing 
off-hand.  If  he  draws  largely  on  another  for  this 
purpose,  he  ought  to  make  compensation  after- 
wards, if  he  has  the  means.  This  has  been  taken  for 
a  piece  of  the  primeval  rock  of  Communism  cropping 
up  from  underneath  subsequent  human  formations, 
— quite  a  mistaken  notion.  There  is  no  Communism 
whatever  in  the  transaction.  Up  to  the  instant 
when  the  needy  man  seizes  the  article  that  he 
requires  to  save  him  from  death,  that  article  still 
belongs  to  the  owner  from  whom  he  takes  it,  who 
is  bound  in  charity  to  give  it  to  the  needy  party,  but 
not  in  justice.  Extreme  need  does  not  confer  owner- 
ship, nor  dispossess  any  previous  owner :  but  it 
confers  the  right  of  taking  what  is  another's  as 
tiiOQgh  it  belonged  to  no  one ;  and  in  the  taking, 
the  thing  passes  into  the  ownership  of  the  new 
occupant,  so  that  for  the  previous  owner  forcibly  to 


iSi  OF  PROPERTY. 


resume  it  would  be  a  violation  of  justice.  English 
law  does  not  recognise  this  right — properly  enough, 
for  with  us  it  would  be  made  a  plea  for  much  steal- 
ing— but  refers  the  destitute  to  the  parish.  The  law 
is  considerately  worked  by  the  magistrates.  A 
starving  man,  who  took  a  loaf  off  a  baker's  tray, 
has  been  known  to  be  sentenced  to  a  few  hours' 
imprisonment  with  two  good  meals. 

6.  As  St.  Paul  says  (2  Cor.  xii.  14),  "  parents 
ought  to  lay  up  for  their  children,"  that  they  in 
whom  their  own  existence  is  continued,  may  not  be 
left  unprovided  for  at  their  decease.  The  amount 
laid  up  necessary  for  this  purpose,  ought  not  to  be 
diverted  from  it.  Thus  much  at  least  Natural  Law 
can  tell  us  of  the  right  of  inheritance.  And  con- 
cerning testamentary  right  these  natural  considera- 
tions are  forthcoming,  that  it  adds  to  the  desirability 
of  property,  that  it  secures  deference  to  the  wealthy 
in  their  old  age,  and  that  the  abolition  of  it  might 
be  frustrated  by  an  apparatus  of  confidential  dona- 
Hones  inter  vivos,  that  is  to  say,  making  the  property 
over  in  trust  before  death.  Further  enlargement  of 
the  natural  basis  of  testamentary  right  may  be 
effected  by  the  judicious  reader. 

Readi7igs. — Ar.,  Pol.,  II.,  v.,  nn.  i — 16  ;  De  Lugo, 
De  just,  et  jure,  vi.,  nn.  2 — 6;  ib.,  xri.,  nn.  143,  144; 
Locke,  Of  Civil  Government,  c.v. ;  id.,  Of  Government, 
nn.  88,  8g. 

Section  II. — Of  Private  Capital. 

I.  Reverting  to  a  former  section  (c.  v.,  s.  v.,  nn. 
I — 5,  p.  255)  we  lay  down  this  distinction :  Goods  held 


PRIVATE   CAPITAL.  ^^3 

for  their  use  value  are  consunicr's  wealth  :  goods  held 
for  their  market  value  are  producer's  wealth,  otherwise 
called  capita/.  Capital  then  is  that  wealth  which 
a  man  holds  for  the  purpose  of  gaining  further 
wealth  by  means  of  commercial  exchange.  It  is 
represented  by  the  razors  that  are  made,  not  to  mow 
the  manly  beard,  or  youthful  moustache,  of  the 
maker,  but,  as  the  Yorkshire  vendor  put  it,  "to 
sell." 

2.  Those  economists  who  would  allow  no  private 
ownership  of  capital,  but  would  have  all  capital  to 
be  State  property,  are  called  Socialists.  They  stand 
distinctly  apart  from  the  Communists,  whom  we 
have  been  labouring  to  refute  in  the  last  section. 
The  Communist  forbids  all  private  property:  the 
Socialist  allows  private  property,  but  in  the  shape 
of  consumer's  wealth  alone.  The  Communist  ignores 
the  necessity  of  labour :  the  Socialist  schemes  to 
make  all  men  work.  The  Communist  contemplates 
a  hand-to-mouth  dispensation  of  all  things :  the 
Socialist  locks  all  things  up,  wages  in  private  coffers, 
capital  in  government  stores.  The  Communist  is  a 
madman :  the  speculations  of  the  Socialist  are  some- 
times deep. 

3.  To  what  are  we  to  attribute  the  rise  of 
Socialism,  and  its  growth  and  propagation  so  fast 
and  vigorous,  that,  its  supporters  say  with  some 
colour  of  evidence,  it  is  a  theory  destined  within  a 
measurable  space  of  time  to  pass  into  actual 
practice,  whether  men  will  or  no  ?  The  cause  is 
not  far  to  seek.  There  has  lighted  a  plague  upon 
all    civilized    countries,    an    outbreak    fearful    and 


28/*  Oh-   PROPEiny. 


severe :  only  by  the  great  blessing  of  Providence, 
joined  to  drastic  remedial  measures  on  our  part,  can 
we  cope  with  the  evil.  The  plague  is  a  cancerous 
formation  of  luxury  growing  out  of  a  root  of 
pauperism.  It  is  a  disease  old  as  the  world,  but 
the  increase  of  commerce  and  intercommunication 
has  occasioned  its  bursting  upon  our  generation  in 
a  peculiarly  virulent  form.  And  what  is  more,  ours 
being  a  talking  age,  the  disease  is  made  the  staple  of 
speeches  infinite,  and  the  masses  are  clamouring  for 
a  remedy.     The  remedy  proposed  is  Sociahsm. 

4.  Socialism  in  its  essence  is  an  attempt  to 
transfer  to  the  State,  governed  by  universal  suffrage, 
the  wealth,  and  with  the  wealth  the  social  duties, 
of  what  have  hitherto  been  the  wealthy  and  govern- 
ing classes.  It  is  not  enough  for  the  multitude  that 
they  are  getting  the  political  power  out  of  the  hands 
of  the  landlord  and  the  capitalist :  they  envy  the 
one  his  broad  acres,  and  the  other  his  investments. 
All  must  be  theirs,  sovereignty  and  wealth  alike.  If 
wealth  has  its  duties,  the  people  collectively  with 
cheerful  acceptance  will  undertake  those  duties. 
*  It  shall  be  ours,  not  only  to  be  king,  but  to  be 
employer,  patron,  landlord,  educator.  We  will 
assign  to  the  workman  his  wages,  just  and  ample 
and  perennial :  we  will  adjust  production  to  demand  : 
we  will  be  the  restorers  of  agriculture :  we  will 
monopolise  the  carrying-trade :  we  alone  will  sell 
whatever  shall  be  sold :  we  will  wash  the  workman 
in  pubhc  baths :  his  taste  shall  be  elevated  by  our 
statues  and  pictures,  our  theatres,  our  music-halls, 
and  our  churches ;  we  will  gratify  his  curiosity  with 


PRIVATE   CAPITAL  285 

onr  news-ag-encics,  feed  his  thought  with  our  popular 
philosopliy,  educate  his  children  as  our  own  in  our 
primary  and  secondary  schools.  Furthermore,  we 
will  provide  the  long  desiderated  career  open  to 
talents.  The  stupid  boy,  though  his  father  was 
our  Prime  Minister,  shall  be  made  a  cabin-boy,  or 
a  scavenger's  assistant,  an  awful  example  to  young 
gentlemen  who  fail  to  pass  the  Government  exami- 
nations :  while  we  will  j)ick  up,  not  the  gutter 
child,  for  there  shall  be  no  more  children  in  gutters, 
but  the  son  of  the  woman  at  the  mill,  and  testing 
him  and  assigning  his  career,  first  by  school  exami« 
nations,  and  then  by  his  official  performances,  we 
will  make  him  in  time  Poet  Laureate  or  President 
of  the  Board  of  Trade,  according  to  the  bent  of 
his  genius.'  The  astonished  workman  turns  round 
upon  the  exhibitors  of  this  fairy  vision :  *  And  pray 
who  are  You  ?  '  '  Oh,  you,  we,  the  people,  all  of  us 
together.  Come  put  your  shoulder  to  the  wheel, 
and  up  goes  our  enterprise.  Or  rather  our  first 
motion  is  downwards :  down  with  landlords  and 
cotton-lords  and  lords  of  parliament,  down  with 
contractors  and  stock-jobbers  and  all  who  live  on 
the  interest  of  their  money,  and  then  our  honour- 
able multitude  will  possess  and  administer  and 
govern.' 

5.  If  angels  are  to  hold  the  collective  ownership 
of  capital  and  the  government  of  men  in  the  Socialist 
Commonwealth ;  or  if  every  citizen,  retaining  in 
his  private  capacity  all  the  follies  and  vices  that 
human  fiesh  is  heir  to,  shall  still  be  vested  in 
angelic  attributes,  whenever  he  sits  as  legislator  or 


286  OF  PROPERTY 


judge,  or  acts  on  the  executive  of  a  Socialist  com- 
mission, — then  this  new  Commonwealth  is  likely  to 
prove  a  blessed  substitute  for  the  rule  of  the  higher 
classes,  which  in  one  way  or  another  has  hitherto 
obtained  in  civilized  society.  But  till  angelic 
attributes  descend  on  earth,  we  shall  not  find  a 
cure  for  the  evils  of  cities  and  countries  in  simply 
doubling  the  functions  of  government,  and  placing 
all  sovereign  rights,  and  all  the  most  important  of 
proprietory  rights  and  duties,  in  the  hands  of  a 
numerical  majority. 

6.  Capital,  as  we  have  seen,  is  a  collection  of 
market  or  exchange  values  in  view  of  further 
exchange.  If  we  call  supply  S  and  demand  D, 
market  value  is  a  social  estimate  of  the  fraction  ^. 
Another  definition  has  been  given :  Market  value 
is  a  social  estimate  of  the  amount  of  socially  useful 
labour  which  a  given  article  contains.  This  second 
definition  contains  this  much  of  truth  in  it,  that 
directly  as  the  demand  for  an  article,  and  inversely 
as  the  supply  of  the  same,  is  the  amount  of  labour 
which  men  find  it  worth  their  while  to  spend  upon 
that  article  for  commercial  purposes.  Otherwise 
the  definition  is  unsatisfactory  and  involved,  and 
leads  to  endless  discussion.  Without  entering  into 
these  discussions,  we  will  remark  an  ambiguity  in 
the  term  on  which  they  all  roll,  the  term  labour^ 
which  ambiguity  is  at  the  bottom  of  three  fourths 
of  the  sophistries  of  popular  Socialism. 

7.  There  were  two  pillars  put  at  the  entrance  of 
Solomon's  temple,  one  on  the  right  hand  and  the 
other  on  the  left :  that  which  was  on  the  right  hand 


PRIVATE   CAPITAL.  Mf 

he  called,  according  to  the  Septiiagint,  Direction, 
Kar6pO(jocrL<;,  and  that  on  the  left  hand,  Strength,  la-xv'i' 
(2  Par.  iii.  17.)  Further  we  are  told  that  Solomon 
set  seventy  thousand  men  to  carry  burdens  on  their 
shoulders,  and  eighty  thousand  to  hew  stones  in  the 
mountains,  and  three  thousand  six  hundred  to  be 
overseers  of  the  work  of  the  people.  (2  Par.  ii.  18.) 
The  history  is  manifest.  Strength  and  Direction 
build  the  Temple :  Strength,  or  Manual  Labour, 
represented  by  the  hodmen  and  quarrymen,  and  the 
rest  of  the  "  hands  :  "  Direction,  or  IVIental  Labour, 
represented  by  the  overseers.  Yet  not  by  them 
alone :  surely  we  must  count  in  as  doers  of  mental 
labour  the  designer  of  the  Temple,  or  at  least  of  its 
decorations,  that  "  most  wise  and  skilful  man,  my 
father  Hiram;"  and  still  more  King  Solomon  him- 
self and  David,  the  two  royal  minds  that  originated 
and  perfected  the  idea ;  and  David's  generals,  Joab 
and  Banaias,  who  secured  the  peace  that  was  neces- 
sary as  a  condition  of  the  building ;  and  innumer- 
able other  men  of  place  and  power  in  the  nation, 
but  for  whose  thought  and  prudence  the  strength  of 
the  workman  would  have  been  thrown  aw^ay  like  a 
river  poured  out  in  the  Libyan  desert.  From  this 
example,  eked  out  with  a  little  thought  of  his  own, 
the  reader  may  estimate  the  wisdom  and  credit  of 
those  who  tell  factory  hands  that  it  is  their  labour 
which  produces  all  the  wealth  of  their  employer, 
and  that,  in  the  day  when  every  man  shall  receive 
his  due,  the  employer  shall  be  made  a  workmen  like 
themselves,  and  his  wealth  shall  go  to  the  increase 
of  their  common  wages. 


e88  OF  PROPERTY. 


8.  Certainly,  it  will  be  said,  the  employer  should 
be  paid  for  his  mental  labour,  but  why  at  so  enor- 
mously higher  a  rate  than  the  manual  labourers  ? 
If  we  say,  '  because  his  labour  is  more  valuable,' 
some  Socialists  would  join  issue  on  the  score  that 
labour  is  valuable  according  to  the  time  that  it 
takes,  and  the  employer  works  shorter  hours  than 
his  men.  But  this  taking  account  of  quantity  alone 
in  labour  is  an  ignoring  of  the  distinction  which  we 
have  drawn  of  two  qualities  or  orders  of  labour, 
mental  and  manual ;  one  more  valuable  than  the 
other  as  being  scarcer  and  in  greater  demand,  so 
that  a  short  time  of  one  may  be  set  against  a  long 
time  of  another,  like  a  little  gold  against  a  heap  of 
brass.  Any  man  accustomed  to  both  orders  of 
labour  must  have  observed,  that  while  he  can  work 
with  his  hands  at  almost  any  time  when  he  is  well, 
the  highest  labour  of  his  intellect  can  be  done  only 
at  rare  intervals,  and  that  in  one  happy  hour  he  will 
sometimes  accomplish  more  than  in  a  day.  As  the 
same  man  differs  from  himself  at  different  times,  so 
does  one  man  from  another  in  the  average  value  of 
his  mental  efforts :  this  value  is  not  measured  by 
time. 

9.  Abandoning  this  untenable  position.  Socialists 
still  ask :  '  But  is  the  difference  in  the  value  of 
their  labour  quite  so  vast  as  is  the  interval  between 
the  profits  of  the  employer  and  the  pay  of  his  poor 
drudges  ?  '  Honestly  we  cannot  say  that  it  is.  We 
are  fain  to  fall  back  upon  the  consideration,  that 
the  employer  contributes,  not  only  his  brains  to  the 
work,  but  his  capital.     *Ah,  that  is  just  it,'  is  the 


PRIVATE  CAPITAL.  289 


Socialists'  quick  reply  :  *  We  propose  to  relieve  him 
of  his  capital,  and  remunerate  his  brainvvork  only  : 
by  that  means  we  shall  be  able  to  pay  sufficiently 
handsome  wages  for  management,  according  to  the 
ratio  of  mental  and  manual  labour,  and  at  the  same 
time  have  a  sufficiently  large  surplus  over  to  raise  the 
wages  of  his  needy  comrades,  those  seventy  thousand 
hodmen  and  eighty  thousand  quarrymen.' 

10.  Two  reasons  may  be  given  for  turning  away 
from  this  seductive  proposal,  and  leaving  capital 
(not  consumer's  wealth  merely)  in  private  hands, — 
and  that  not  only  in  the  hands  of  what  we  may 
call  mentally  productive  capitalists,  men  who  oversee 
their  own  enterprises  and  manage  their  own  work- 
men, but  even  of  unproductive  capitalists,  men 
who  have  shares  in  and  reap  profits  out  of  a 
business  which  they  never  meddle  with.  The  first 
reason  is,  because  this  position  of  the  productive, 
and  still  more  that  of  the  unproductive  capitalist,  is 
a  prize  for  past  industry  expended  upon  production. 
To  understand  this,  we  must  recollect  once  more 
that  men  work,  not  as  individuals,  but  as  heads  of 
families.  Every  working  man,  from  the  sailor  to 
the  shop-boy,  covets  for  himself  two  things,  pay 
and  leisure.  The  same  two  things  do  mentally  pro- 
ductive labourers  covet.  But  they  covet  them,  not 
for  themselves  alone,  but  for  their  families,  and  more 
even  for  their  families  than  for  themselves.  They 
weary  their  brains,  planning  and  managing,  that  in 
old  age  they  may  retire  on  a  competence,  and  hand 
down  that  same  competence,  undiminished  by  their 
having  lived  on  it,  to  their  children.  Thus  the 
T 


290  OF  PROPERTY. 


young  man  works  and  produces,  that  the  old  man, 
and  the  child  to  come,  may  have  exemption  from 
productive  labour,  an  abiding  exemption,  which 
cannot  be  unless  he  is  allowed  to  live  on  the  interest 
of  accumulated  capital.  These  positions  of  affluence 
and  rest — sinecures  they  are,  so  far  as  production  is 
concerned — are  the  prizes  awarded  to  the  best  pro- 
ductive labour.  What  they  who  do  that  labour  aim 
at,  is  not  wages  but  exemption  from  toil  :  their  wish 
is  not  so  much  to  be  wealthy  and  have  leisure  them- 
selves as  to  found  a  family  in  wealth  and  leisure, — 
the  one  possible  foundation  of  such  a  family  being 
a  store  of  private  capital.  Socialists  of  course  will 
offer  nobler  prizes  for  the  best  productive  labour, — 
honour,  and  the  satisfaction  of  having  served  the 
community,  a  satisfaction  which  they  would  have 
men  trained  from  childhood  to  relish  above  all  other 
joys.  Unfortunately,  this  taste  is  yet  unformed,  and 
the  stimulus  of  these  nobler  prizes  is  still  unproved 
by  experience.  Meanwhile  men  do  work  hard,  to 
the  advantage  of  the  community,  for  the  ignobler 
prize  of  family  affluence  and  ease.  Socialists  are 
going  to  take  away  the  good  boy's  cake  and  give 
him  a  sunflower. 

II.  The  second  reason  for  leaving  capital  in 
private,  even  unproductive  hands,  begins  from  the 
consideration,  that  the  highest  end  of  man  on  earth 
is  not  production,  just  as  it  is  not  consumption,  of 
the  necessaries  and  luxuries  of  life.  Aristotle  bids 
us,  as  much  as  possible  in  this  life,  "to  play  the 
immortal  (aOavarl^ecv),  and  do  our  utmost  to  live  by 
the  best  element  in  our  nature,"  that  is,  the  intellect. 


PRIVATE   CAPITAL.  291 

{Ethics,  c.  ii.,  s.  ii.,  n.  7,  p.  9.)  There  is  the  intellectual 
life  of  the  statesman  in  the  practical  order  :  and  in 
the  speculative  order,  that  of  the  poet,  of  the  artist, 
of  the  scholar,  of  the  devout  contemplative — the  out- 
come of  learned  and  pious  leisure,  and  freedom  from 
vulgar  cares.  One  man  ascending  into  this  higher 
and  better  region  helps  his  neighbour  to  follow.  The 
neighbour  can  follow,  even  though  he  be  not  free 
from  productive  cares,  but  the  leader  ought  to  be 
free,  if  he  is  to  soar  a  high,  sustained  and  powerful 
flight,  and  guide  others  aloft.  These  unproductive 
capitalist  families  then  form  what  we  may  call,  by 
a  figure  which  rhetoricians  call  oxymoron,  something 
which  comes  very  near  a  bull, — we  may  call  them 
an  endowed  lay-clergy  :  they  are  told  off  from  the 
rest  of  men  to  lead  the  way  in  doing,  and  causing  to 
be  done,  the  highest  work  of  humanity.  The  absence 
of  the  First  Class  of  Workers  would  render  the 
Socialist  Utopia  a  very  vulgar  place. 

12.  Nature's  ideal  is  :  To  all,  plenty  :  to  some, 
superabundance.  The  superabundance  of  some  is 
not  necessarily  incompatible  with  all  having  plenty  : 
nay  it  is  a  positive  furtherance  of  that  and  of  still 
higher  ends,  as  has  been  shown.  But  it  is  a  position 
of  advantage  that  may  be  abused,  and  is  abused 
most  wantonly  :  hence  there  comes  to  be  question 
of  Socialism. 

13.  The  Socialism  above  described  is  of  the  old  sort,  called 
Collectivism.  A  new  variety  has  appeared,  Syndicalism. 
Syndicalism  is  opposed  to  nationalisation  and  centralisation 
of  capital  and  power  :  it  would  convert  workers  into  owners 
in  each  separate  department  of  labour, — colliers  to  own  the 
coal,  railwaymen  the  lines  and  rolling-stock,  agricultural 
labourers  the  land,  and  so  on.     Collectivism  might  conceivably 


292  OF  PROPERTY. 


be  put  in  practice,  given  a  sufficiently  high  standard  of  social 
virtue,  a  quality  which  Socialists  are  not  in  the  way  to  get. 
As  for  Syndicalism  in  practice,  I  leave  that  to  the  reader  to 
imagine.  Syndicalism  stigmatises  Collectivism  as  a  gross 
tyranny.  Thus  divided  into  two  irreconcilable  factions,  the 
Socialists  are  not  a  happy  family. 

Readings. — The  Creed  of  Socialism,  by  Joseph 
Rickaby     (Anti-socialist     Union,    Victoria     Street, 

Westminster). 

Section  III. — Of  Landed  Property. 

1.  Land,  like  cotton,  timber,  or  iron-ore,  is  a 
raw  material  wrought  up  by  man.  Land,  like  any 
other  thing,  becomes  an  article  of  property  originally 
by  occupation,  and  its  value  is  enhanced  by  labour. 
There  is  no  more  reason  why  all  land,  or  the  rents 
of  all  land,  should  belong  to  the  State,  than  why  all 
house  property,  or  all  house  rents,  should  belong  to 
the  State.  If  the  people  need  land  to  live  on,  so  do 
they  need  houses  to  live  in,  coals  to  burn,  and  shoes 
to  wear.  Socialism,  once  admitted,  cannot  be  con- 
fined to  land  alone.  It  will  exterminate  "  the  lord 
manufacturer"  as  remorselessly  as  it  exterminates 
the  landlord. 

2.  Every  man,  it  is  contended,  has  a  right  to 
live  on  the  fruits  of  the  soil.  The  proposition  is 
needlessly  long.  It  should  be  put  simply  :  Every 
man  has  a  right  to  live.  For  as  to  living  on  the 
fruits  of  the  soil,  there  is  absolutely  nothing  else 
that  man  can  live  on.  All  human  nutriment  what- 
ever is  derived  from  what  geologists  call  pulverised 
rocks,  that  is,  soil.  But  if  it  is  meant  that  every 
man  has  a  right  to  live  on  the  fruits  of  some  soil  or 
land  of  his  own,  where  is  the  proof?     So  long  as 


LANDED   PROPERTY.  293 


the  fruits  of  the  earth  do  not  fail  to  reach  a  man's 
mouth,  what  matters  it  whose  earth  it  is  that  grows 
them  ?  Some  of  the  richest  as  well  as  the  poorest 
members  of  the  community  are  landless  men.  Con- 
fiscate rent  to  take  the  place  of  taxation,  and  some 
of  the  richest  men  in  the  community  will  go  tax-free. 

3.  The  land  on  which  a  nation  is  settled,  we  are 
told,  belongs  to  that  nation.  Yes,  it  belongs  to 
them  as  individuals,  yet  not  so  that  a  foreigner  is 
excluded  by  natural  law  from  owning  any  portion  of 
it.  But  the  government  have  over  the  land,  and 
over  all  the  property  upon  it,  what  is  called  alUim 
dominium,  or  eminent  domain,  which  is  a  power  of 
commanding  private  proprietors  to  part  with  their 
property  for  public  purposes,  with  compensation, 
whenever  compensation  is  possible.  Thus  when  a 
railway  gets  its  Act  of  Parliament,  the  owners 
through  whose  estates  the  projected  line  is  to  run 
are  compelled  by  an  exercise  of  eminent  domain  to 
sell  to  the  company.  By  the  same  power  the 
government  in  a  besieged  city,  when  hard  pressed, 
might  seize  upon  all  the  stores  of  food  and  fuel 
within  the  walls,  even  without  compensation.  Altum 
dominium,  which  is  not  dominion  properly  so  called, 
is  sufficient  for  all  national  emergencies,  without 
making  the  State  the  universal  landlord. 

4.  It  seems  impossible  to  imagine  an  emergency 
that  would  justify  any  government  in  nationalizing 
all  the  land  at  once  without  compensation.  None 
but  a  wealthy  government  could  afford  the  compen- 
sation requisite  ;  and  the  emergency  would  have  to 
be  severe  indeed,  to  make  it  wise  of  them  to  incur 


j!94  OF  PROPERTY. 


such  an  expense.  We  can  imagine  a  government 
in  a  newly  settled  country  starting  on  the  under- 
standing that  all  land  was  State  land,  and  that  all 
ground  rents  were  to  be  paid  into  the  State  ex- 
chequer. This  would  amount  to  taking  rents  for 
taxes ;  and  instead  of  a  landlord  in  every  district 
we  should  have  a  tax-gatherer.  Probably  further 
taxation  would  be  necessary:  in  England  at  any 
rate  the  annual  expenditure  exceeds  the  rental  .by 
some  twenty  millions.  Government,  we  may  sup- 
pose, would  grant  leases  of  land :  when  the  lease 
fell  in,  the  rent  would  be  raised  for  unearned  incre- 
ment, and  lowered  for  decrement,  but  not  raised 
for  improvements  effected  by  the  tenant  himself. 
In  that  case  the  tenant  in  two  or  three  generations 
might  be  a  quasi-proprietor,  his  rent  being  ridicu- 
lously small  in  comparison  v»dth  the  annual  value  of 
the  holding.  The  improvements  might  be  the  im- 
provements of  his  grandfather,  or  even  those  of  a 
complete  stranger,  from  whom  he  had  bought  the 
tenancy.  Anyhow  they  might  be  the  better  portion 
of  the  value  of  the  land,  and  would  not  be  govern- 
ment property.  Or  would  the  government  insist 
on  purchasing  the  improvements,  and  look  out  for  a 
new  tenant  paying  a  higher  rent  ?  Lastly,  would  the 
government  themselves  make  such  improvements  as 
many  an  English  landlord  makes  now,  for  love  of 
the  country  about  him  and  love  of  his  own  people  ? 
5.  It  would  be  most  difficult  to  prevent  private 
property  arising  in  land,  even  if  it  all  did  belong  to 
the  State  to  start  with.  "  Suppose  ^^lo  paid  for  a 
piece  of  land  for  a  year,  and  suppose  the  occupier 


LANDED   PROPERTY.  295 

said,  Let  me  have  it  for  ten  years,  and  I  will  give  you 
^Tao  a  year,  ought  not  the  State  to  accept  the  offer  ? 
Then  suppose  he  said.  Give  it  me  for  ever  and  I  will 
pay  £^0  a  year  ?  Again,  ought  not  the  State  to 
agree  ?  He  would  then  be  that  hateful  creature  a 
landowner,  subject  to  a  rent-charge.  Now  suppose 
the  State  wanted  to  do  work  and  had  to  borrow 
money,  and  suppose  he  offered  to  give  for  the  re- 
demption of  the  rent-charge  a  sum  which  could  not 
be  borrowed  for  less  than  ^^40  a  year.  Again,  ought 
not  the  State  to  accept  his  offer  ?  Yet  in  that  case 
he  would  become  a  hopelessly  unmitigated  landlord." 
(Lord  Bramwell.) 

6.  When  there  is  an  alarm  of  fire  in  a  theatre, 
any  one  who  could  convince  the  audience  that  there 
was  time  enough  for  them  all  to  file  out  in  slow 
succession  by  the  door,  would  avert  the  greatest 
danger  that  threatened  them,  that  of  being  crushed 
and  trampled  on  by  one  another.  Mankind  in  pur- 
suit of  wealth  are  like  a  crowd  rushing  excitedly 
through  a  narrow  place  of  exit.  Whatever  man,  or 
body  of  men,  or  institution,  or  doctrine,  will  moderate 
this  "love  of  money"  {(fyiXapyvpia),  which  St.  Paul 
(i  Tim.  vi.  10)  declares  to  be  "  the  root  of  all  evils," 
the  same  is  a  benefactor  to  the  human  race,  prevent- 
ing that  cruel  oppression  of  the  poor,  which  comes 
of  ruthlessly  buying  land,  labour,  everything,  in  the 
cheapest  market  and  selling  it  in  the  dearest.  The 
landlord  who  always  evicts,  if  he  is  not  paid  the 
highest  competition  rent, — the  employer  who  brings 
in  from  afar  the  hands  that  will  work  at  the  lowest 
starvation  wage, — these  vultures  are  worse  enemies 
to  society  than  Socialists,  for  they  occasion  Socialism 


2g6  OF  PROPERTY. 


7.  Socialism,  whether  in  land  alone  or  in  all  capital, 
is  an  endeavour  to  accomplish  by  State  control  the 
results  that  ought  to  be  achieved  by  private  virtue. 
A  landlord,   or  an  employer,   who   remembers   his 
position  as  being  what  Homer  calls  "  a  king  of  men," 
ava^  avhpoiv, — remembers  too,  with  Aristotle,  that  a 
prince  exists  for  his  people, — and  who,   besides  a 
quasi-royal  care  for  the  body  of  tenantry  or  work- 
men over  whom  he  presides,  has  something  too  of  a 
fatherly  interest  in  every  one  of  them,  their  persons 
and  their  families,  holding  it  to  be  a  personal  tie 
with  himself,  to  be  in  his  employment  or  settled  upon 
his  land, — such  a  man  and  the  multitude  of  such  men 
form  the  best  bulwark  a  country  can  possess  against 
Socialism.    Such  a  landlord  or  employer  is  a  praesens 
numen  to  his  workpeople  or  tenants.    In  the  absence 
of  this  protective,  personal  influence  of  the  rich  over 
the  poor;    in  the  disorganization  of  society  conse- 
quent upon  the  misconduct  of  its  subordinate  chiefs; 
in  the  stand-off  attitude  of  the  higher  classes,  and 
the  defiant  independence  of  the  lower;  and  in  the 
greed  of  material  goods  that  is  common  to  them 
both,  there  lurks  a  danger  of  unknown  magnitude  to 
our  modern  civilization. 

Reading.— 'Leo  XIII.  on  the  Condition  of  Labour, 
Encyclical  of  15th  May,  i8gi.^ 

1  "The  right  of  property  attaches  to  things  produced  by  labour, 
but  cannot  attach  to  things  created  by  God."  So  Henry  George, 
Condition  of  Labour,  pp.  3,  4.  How  then  do  we  read  in  Progress  and 
Poverty,  bk.  7.  ch.  i :  "The  pen  with  which  I  am  writing  is  justly 
mine,"  and  that,  in  the  last  resort,  on  account  of  "the  rights 
of  those  who  dug  the  material  from  the  ground  and  converted  it 
into  a  pen  "  ?  Was  not  that  material,  iron-ore,  "  created  by  God," 
equally  with  any  other  portion  of  the  earth's  crust  that  we  may 
please  to  call  land? 


CHAPTER   VIII. 

OF   THE    STATE. 

Section  I.-^-Ofthe  Monstrosities  called  Leviathan  and  Social 

Contract. 

I.  Thomas  Hobbes,  than  whom  never  was  greater 
genius  for  riding  an  idea,  right  or  wrong,  to  the  full 
length  that  it  will  go,  was  born  in  1588:  and  not- 
withstanding his  twelve  pipes  of  tobacco  daily,  his 
vigorous  constitution  endured  to  his  ninety-second 
year.  The  first  half  of  his  life  fell  in  with  the  age  of 
the  greatest  predominance  of  Calvinism.  In  religion 
he  was  scarcely  a  Calvinist,  indeed  he  laboured 
under  a  suspicion  of  atheism  :  but  his  philosophy  is 
accurately  cast  in  the  mould  of  the  grim  theology  of 
Geneva.  We  may  call  it  the  philosophy  of  Calvinism. 
It  has  for  its  central  tenet,  that  human  nature  either 
was  from  the  first,  or  is  become,  bad,  "  desperately 
wicked,"  depraved,  corrupt,  and  utterly  abominable, 
so  that  whatever  is  natural  to  man,  in  so  far  forth  as 
it  is  natural,  is  simply  evil.  The  remedy  for  our 
evil  nature  Hobbes  finds  in  no  imputed  merits  of  a 
Redeemer,  no  irresistible  victorious  grace,  but  in 
the  masterful  coercion  of  a  despotic  civil  power. 
But,  lest  any  one  should  suspect  that  there  was  at 
least  this  good  in  man,  a  propensity  to  civil  society 


298  OF  THE   STATE. 

and  obedience  to  the  rulers  of  cities,  Hobbes  insists 
that  man  is  by  nature  wholly  averse  to  society  with 
his  kind  :  that  the  type  of  the  race  is  an  Ishmael,  "  a 
wild  man,  his  hand  against  all  men,  and  all  men's 
hands  against  him  :  "  in  fact  that  the  state  of  nature 
is  a  state  of  war  all  round.  He  writes  {Leviathan, 
c.  xiii.) :  "Men  have  no  pleasure,  but  on  the  contrary 
a  great  deal  of  grief,  in  keeping  company  where 
there  is  no  power  able  to  overawe  them  all.  For 
every  man  looketh  that  his  companion  should  value 
him  at  the  same  rate  he  sets  on  himself;  and  upon 
all  signs  of  contempt  or  undervaluing  naturally  en- 
deavours, as  far  as  he  dares  (which  among  them  that 
have  no  common  power  to  keep  them  quiet,  is  far 
enough  to  make  them  destroy  each  other),  to  extort 
a  greater  value  from  his  contemners  by  damage, 
and  from  others  by  the  example.  .  .  .  Hereby  it  is 
manifest,  that  during  the  time  that  men  hve  without 
a  power  to  keep  them  all  in  awe,  they  are  in  that 
condition  which  is  called  war,  and  such  a  war  as 
is  of  every  man  against  every  man.  ...  In  such 
condition  there  is  no  place  for  industry,  because  the 
fruit  thereof  is  uncertain,  and  consequently  no  culture 
of  the  earth :  no  navigation,  nor  use  of  the  com- 
modities that  may  be  imported  by 'sea:  no  com- 
modious building :  no  instruments  of  moving  and 
removing  such  things  as  require  much  force :  no 
knowledge  of  the  face  of  the  earth :  no  account  of 
time :  no  arts,  no  letters,  no  society ;  and  which  is 
worst  of  all,  continual  fear  and  danger  of  violent 
death;  and  the  life  of  man,  solitary,  poor,  nasty, 
brutish,  and  short.  ...  To  this  war  of  every  man 


LEVIATHAN   AND  SOCIAL   CONTRACT.  29c 

against  every  man  this  also  is  consequent,  that 
nothing  can  be  unjust.  The  notions  of  right  and 
wrong,  justice  and  injustice,  have  there  no  place. 
Where  there  is  no  common  power  there  is  no  law : 
where  no  law,  no  injustice.  ...  It  is  consequent 
also  to  the  same  condition,  that  there  be  no  pro- 
priety, no  dominion,  no  viiv.e  and  thine  distinct,  but 
only  that  to  be  every  man's  that  he  can  get,  and  for 
so  long  as  he  can  keep  it." 

2.  Such  is  what  Hobbes  is  pleased  to  call  "  the 
natural  condition  of  mankind,"  a  condition  which 
man  would  have  every  natural  reason  for  getting  out 
of  with  all  speed,  were  he  ever  so  unhappy  as  to  fall 
into  it.  It  is  true  that,  apart  from  civil  government, 
violence  v/ould  reign  on  earth.  But  it  is  not  true 
that  to  live  apart  from  civil  government  is  the  natural 
condition  of  mankind.  It  is  not  true  that  the  only 
motive  which  draws  men  into  civil  society  is  the  fear 
of  violence,  as  though  there  were  no  such  facts  and 
exigencies  of  human  nature  as  sympathy,  friendship, 
intellectual  curiosity,  art,  religion.  It  is  not  true 
that  the  one  reason  for  the  existence  of  the  civil 
power  consists  in  this,  that  without  the  restraining 
hand  of  the  magistrate  men  would  bite  and  devour 
one  another.  Lastly,  it  is  not  true  that  all  rights, 
notably  rights  of  property,  are  the  creation  of  the 
State.  A  man  is  a  man  first  and  a  citizen  after- 
wards. As  a  man,  he  has  certain  rights  actual  and 
potential  (c.  v.,  s.  i.,  p.  244) :  these  the  State  exists,  not 
to  create,  for  they  are  prior  to  it  in  the  order  of 
nature,  but  to  determine  them,  where  indeterminate, 
to  sanction  and  to  safeguard  them. 


300  OF  THE   STATE. 


Natural  rights  go  before  legal  rights,  and  are  pre- 
supposed to  them,  as  the  law  of  nature  before  that 
law  which  is  civil  and  positive.  It  is  an  "  idol  of  the 
tribe "  of  lawyers  to  ignore  all  law  but  that  upon 
which  their  own  professional  action  takes  its  stand. 

3.  *'  In  considering  man  as  he  must  have  come 
from  the  hands  of  nature,"  writes  Jean  Jacques 
Rousseau,  "  I  behold  an  animal  less  strong  than 
some,  less  active  than  others,  but  upon  the  whole  in 
organism  having  the  advantage  of  them  all.  I  behold 
him  appeasing  his  hunger  under  an  oak,  slaking 
his  thirst  in  the  first  brook,  finding  a  bed  at  the 
foot  of  the  same  tree  that  furnished  his  repast,  and 
there  you  have  all  his  cravings  satisfied."  {Discours 
sur  Vorigme  de  Vinegalite.)  This  noble  savage — quite 
a  contrast  to  Hobbes's  ruffian  primeval,  "nasty, 
brutish,"  and  short-lived — observes  and  imitates  the 
industry,  and  gradually  raises  himself  to  the  instinct, 
of  the  beasts  among  whom  he  lives.  His  constitu- 
tion is  robust,  and  almost  inaccessible  to  malady. 
He  attains  to  old  age,  free  from  gout  and  rheu- 
matism. He  surpasses  the  fiercest  wild  beasts  in 
address  as  much  as  they  surpass  him  in  strength, 
and  so  arrives  to  dwell  among  them  without  fear. 
Yet  withal  he  is  distinguished  from  brutes  by  free- 
will and  perfectibility,  qualities  which  gradually  draw 
him  out  of  his  primeval  condition  of  tranquil  inno- 
cence, lead  him  through  a  long  course  of  splendours 
and  errors,  of  vices  and  virtues,  and  end  by  making 
him  a  tyrant  at  once  over  nature  and  over  himself. 

4.  Rousseau's  life,  1715 — 1778,  was  a  continual 
protest  against  the  formalism,  affectation,  pedantry 


LEVIATHAN   AND   SOCIAL   CONTRACT.  301 

and  despotism  of  the  age  of  the  Bourbons,  His 
ideal  of  man  was  the  unconventional,  unconstrained, 
solitary,  but  harmless  and  easy-going  savage.  Hobbes 
was  the  growth  of  a  sterner  and  more  serious  age. 
The  only  reality  to  him  in  heaven  and  on  earth  was 
force :  his  one  idea  in  philosophy  was  coercion. 
Human  nature  to  him  was  an  embodiment  of  brute 
violence  ever  in  need  of  violent  restraint.  Rousseau, 
an  optimist,  saw  nothing  but  good  in  man's  original 
nature :  to  the  pessimist  mind  of  Hobbes  all  was 
evil  there.  Neither  of  them  saw  any  natural  adapta- 
tion to  social  life  in  the  human  constitution.  To 
live  in  society  was,  in  both  their  views,  an  artificial 
arrangement,  an  arbitrary  convention.  But  Hobbes 
found  in  the  intolerable  evils  of  a  state  of  nature  an 
excellent  reason  why  men  should  quit  it  for  the 
unnatural  condition  of  citizens.  Rousseau  found 
no  reason  except,  as  he  says,  qnelque  funeste  hasard. 
The  problem  for  Hobbes  stood  thus :  how  men, 
entering  society,  might  be  "cribbed,  cabined,  and 
confined "  to  the  utmost  in  order  to  keep  down 
their  native  badness.  Rousseau's  concern  was,  how 
one  might  so  become  a  citizen  as  yet  to  retain  to 
the  full  the  delightful  liberty  of  a  tropical  savage. 
Hobbes's  solution  is  the  Leviaiha",,  Rousseau's  the 
Social  Contract.  The  prize,  we  think,  rests  with  the 
Englishman  :  but  the  reader  shall  judge. 

5.  And  first  of  the  Social  Contract.  Rousseau 
proposes  "to  find  a  form  of  association  which  shall 
defend  and  protect  with  all  the  strength  of  the  com- 
munity the  person  and  the  goods  of  each  associate, 
and  whereby  each  one,  uniting  himself  to  all,  may 


302  OF  THE   STATE. 


nevertheless  obey  none  but  himself  and  remain 
as  free  as  before."  {Contrat  Social,  i.  6.)  This 
proposal  is  hopeless,  it  is  a  contradiction  in  terms. 
No  man  can  contract  and  remain  as  free  as  before, 
but  he  binds  himself  either  under  a  wider  obligation 
to  do  or  abstain,  where  he  was  not  bound  before,  or 
under  a  stronger  obligation  where  he  was  bound 
already.  Nevertheless  Rousseau  finds  a  means  of 
accomplishing  the  impossible  and  the  self-contra- 
dictory. "Each  of  us  puts  into  a  common  stock 
his  person  and  all  his  power  under  the  supreme 
direction  of  the  general  will ;  and  we  receive  in  our 
turn  the  offering  of  the  rest,  each  member  as  an 
inseparable  part  of  the  whole.  Instantly,  instead 
of  the  private  person  of  each  contracting  party, 
this  act  of  association  produces  a  m.oral  and  col- 
lective body,  composed  of  as  many  members  as  the 
assembly  has  voices,  which  body  receives  by  this 
same  act  its  unity,  its  common  Ego,  its  life  and  its 
will."  (ib.)  This  awful  signing  away  of  all  your 
rights,  so  that  your  very  personality  is  merged  in 
that  of  the  community — a  self-renunciation  going  far 
beyond  that  of  profession  in  any  religious  order — 
ought  certainly,  as  Rousseau  says,  to  be  "  the  most 
voluntary  act  in  the  world ; "  and  he  adds  the 
characteristic  reason :  ''  every  man  being  born  free 
and  master  of  himself,  none  can,  under  any  pretence 
whatsoever,  subject  him  without  his  own  consent." 
{Contrat  Social,  iv.  2.)  Then  you  ask :  When  have 
I  made  this  large  contract  by  the  most  voluntary  act 
in  the  world  ?  Rousseau  replies  :  "  When  the  State 
is  instituted,  consent  is  in  residing."  {ib.)     But,  you 


LEVIATHAN   AND   SOCIAL   CONTRACT.  303 

reply,  my  residence  is  anything  but  the  most  volun- 
tary act  in  the  world  :  it  would  be  awkward  for  me 
to  emigrate ;  and  if  I  did  emigrate,  it  would  only  be 
to  some  other  State  :  I  cannot  possibly  camp  out 
and  be  independent  in  the  woods,  nor  appease  my 
hunger  under  an  oak.  To  this  plea  Rousseau  quite 
gives  in,  remarking  that  "  family,  goods,  the  want  of 
an  asylum,  necessity,  violence,  may  keep  an  inhabi- 
tant in  the  country  in  spite  of  himself;  and  in  that 
case  his  mere  sojourn  no  longer  supposes  his  consent 
to  the  contract."  (ib.)  Then  none  of  us  have  made 
the  contract,  for  we  have  never  had  the  option  of 
living  anywhere  except  in  some  State. 

6.  Hobbes,  after  laying  down  the  necessity  of 
men  combining  for  protection  against  mutual  in- 
justice, observes  that  a  mere  promise  or  agreement 
not  to  injure  any  one  will  not  suffice:  ''for  the 
agreement  of  men  is  by  covenant  only,  which  is 
artificial ;  and  therefore  no  wonder  if  there  be 
something  else  required  besides  covenant  to  make 
their  agreement  constant  and  lasting,  which  is  a 
common  power  to  keep  them  in  awe  and  to  direct 
their  actions  to  the  common  benefit."  He  continues: 
"The  only  way  to  erect  such  a  common  power  .  .  . 
is  to  confer  all  their  power  and  strength  upon  one 
man  or  upon  one  assembly  of  men,  that  may  reduce 
all  their  wills  by  plurality  of  voices  unto  one  will : 
which  is  as  much  as  to  say,  to  appoint  one  man  or 
assembly  of  men  to  bear  their  person  ;  and  every  one 
to  own,  and  to  acknowledge  himself  to  be  the  author 
of,  whatsoever  he  that  so  beareth  their  person  shall 
act  or  cause  to  be  acted  in  those  things  which  con- 


304  OF   THE   STATE. 


cern  the  common  peace  and  safety ;  and  therein  to 
submit  their  wills  every  one  to  his  will,  and  their 
judgments  to  his  judgment.  This  is  more  than 
consent  or  concord, — it  is  a  real  unity  of  them  all 
in  one  and  the  same  person,  made  by  covenant  of 
every  man  with  every  man,  in  such  manner  as  if 
every  man  should  say  to  every  man :  I  authorise,  and 
give  up  my  right  of  governing  myself  to  this  man 
or  to  this  assembly  of  men,  on  this  condition,  that 
thou  give  up  thy  right  to  him,  and  authorise  all  his 
actions  in  like  manner.  This  done,  the  multitude 
so  united  in  one  person  is  called  a  commonwealth,  in 
Latin  civitas.  This  is  the  generation  of  that  great 
Leviathan,  or  rather,  to  speak  more  reverently,  of 
that  mortal  god,  to  whom  we  owe  under  the 
immortal  God  our  peace  and  defence."  {Leviathan, 
c.  xvii.)  This  idea  of  all  the  rights  and  personalities 
of  the  individuals  who  contract  to  live  socially  being 
fused  and  welded  together  into  the  one  resultant 
personality  and  power  of  the  State,  has  evidently 
been  borrowed  by  Rousseau  from  Hobbes.  We 
shall  deal  with  the  idea  presently.  Meanwhile 
several  points  claim  our  notice. 

7.  The  hideous  piece  of  cynicism  whereby  Rous- 
seau {Contrat  Social,  iv.  2),  after  promising  you  that, 
if  you  join  his  commonwealth,  you  shall  obey  none 
but  yourself,  then  goes  on  to  tell  you  that  you  obey 
yourself  in  obeying  the  will  of  the  majority,  even 
when  it  puts  you  in  irons  or  leads  you  to  death — 
because  as  a  citizen  you  have  once  for  all  renounced 
your  own  will,  and  can  only  wish  what  the  majority 
wishes, — has  its  root  in  the  position  of  Hobbes,  that 


LEVIATHAN   AND   SOCIAL   CONTRACT.  303 

"  every  subject  is  author  of  every  act  the  sovereign 
doth."  (Leviathan,  c.  xxi.) 

8.  A  real  and  important  difference  between  the 
Leviathan  and  the  Social  Contract,  is  that  Hobbes 
(c.  xix.)  allows  various  distributions  of  sovereign 
power,  but  prefers  monarchy :  Rousseau  (1.  ii.,  c.  i.) 
will  have  it  that  sovereignty  is  vested  inalienably  in 
the  people  :  of  which  doctrine  more  to  follow. 

g.  Men  are  by  natiire  equal,  say  Rousseau  and 
Hobbes  and  many  more  respectable  authors.  Yes,  in 
their  specific  nature,  that  is,  they  are  all  equally  men. 
Similarly  you  have  it  that  all  triangles  are  equal,  if 
that  is  a  proposition  of  any  value.  But  men  as 
individuals  are  not  all  equal.  One  is  stronger  in 
body,  another  more  able  in  mind :  one  predisposed 
to  virtue,  another  to  vice :  one  born  in  affluence 
and  honour,  another  in  squalor.  Not  men  in  the 
abstract,  but  living  men,  start  at  different  points  of 
vantage,  and  the  distance  between  them  widens  as 
they  run  the  race  of  life.  We  may  lay  it  down  as 
an  axiom,  in  diametric  opposition  to  Rousseau,  that 
inequalities  are  natural,  equalities  artificial. 

10.  Man  is  born  free  :  so  opens  the  first  chapter 
of  the  Contrat  Social.  If  free  of  all  duties,  then 
void  of  all  rights  (c.  v.,  s.  i.,  nn.  5,  7,  pp.  246,  247)  : 
let  him  then  be  promptl}'  knocked  on  the  head  as 
a  sacrifice  to  Malthus ;  and  with  the  misformed 
children  born  in  Plato's  Republic,  "they  will  bury 
him  in  a  secret  and  unseen  spot,  as  is  befitting." 

11.  Hobbes  and  Rousseau  go  upon  this  maxim, 
which  has  overrun  the  modern  world,  that  no  man 
can  be  bound  to  obedience  to  another  without  his 

U 


3o6  OF  THE  STATE. 


own  consent.  The  maxim  would  be  an  excellent 
one,  were  men  framed  like  the  categories  of  Aristotle 
— substance,  quantit}^,  quality,  relation,  and  the  rest 
— each  peering  out  of  his  ow^n  pigeon-hole,  an  inde- 
pendent, self-sufficient  entity.  But  men  are  depen- 
dent, naturally  dependent  whether  the}^  will  or  no, 
every  human  being  on  certain  definite  others, — the 
child  on  the  parent,  the  citizen  on  the  State  whose 
protection  he  enjoys,  and  all  alike  on  God.  These 
natural  dependences  carry  with  them  natural  un- 
covenanted  obediences, — to  parents,  filial  duty — to 
country,  loyalty — to  God,  piety :  all  which  are  em- 
braced in  the  Latin  term  pietas.  (See  St.  Thomas, 
2a  2SS,  q.  loi,  art.  i,  in  corp.)  The  fatal  maxim 
before  us  is  the  annihilation  of  pietas.  In  lieu  of 
loyal  submission  we  get  a  contract,  a  transaction  of 
reasoned  commercial  selfishness  between  equal  and 
equal.  This  perverse  substitution  has  called  forth 
Leo  XIIL's  remark  on  the  men  of  our  time, 
"Nothing  comes  so  amiss  to  them  as  subjection 
and  obedience,"  A^ihil  tarn  molesie  ferunt  quam  subesse 
et  parere.   (Encyclical  on  Christian  Marriage.) 

12.  The  common  extravagance  of  the  Leviathan 
and  the  Social  Contract  is  the  suppression  of  the 
individual,  with  his  rights  and  his  very  personality, 
which  is  all  blended  in  the  State.  (See  Rousseau's 
words  above  quoted,  n.  5,  and  those  of  Hobbes, 
n.  6.)  The  reservations  in  favour  of  the  individual 
made  by  Hobbes,  Leviathan,  c.  xxi.,  and  by  Rous- 
seau, Contrat  Social,  1.  ii.,  c.  iv.,  are  either  trifles  or 
self-contradictions.  But  it  is  not  in  man's  power 
by  any  contiact  thus  to  change  his  nature,  so  as  to 


AGGREGATION   THEORY.  307 

become  from  autocentric  heterocentric  (c.  ii.,  s.  i.,  n.  2, 
p.  203;  c.  v.,  s.  i.,  n.  I,  p.  244),  from  a  person  a  thing, 
from  a  man  a  chattel,  void  of  rights  and  consequently 
of  duties,  and  bound  to  serve  this  Collective  Monster, 
this  Aggregated  Idol,  with  the  absolute  devotedness 
that  is  due  to  God  alone.  The  worship  of  the  new 
Moloch  goes  well  with  the  dark  misanthropism  of 
Hobbes :  but  in  Rousseau,  the  believer  in  the  perfect 
goodness  of  unrestrained  humanity,  it  is  about  the 
most  glaring  of  his  many  inconsistencies.  It  is  of 
course  eagerly  taken  up  by  the  Socialists,  as  carrying 
all  their  conclusions.  It  is  the  political  aspect  of 
Socialism. 

Reading. — Burke,  Warren  Hastings,  Fourth  Day, 
the  passage  beginning,  "  He  have  arbitrary  power!  " 

Section  II. — 0/  the  theory  that  civil  power  is  an  aggregate 
formed  by  subscription  of  the  powers  of  individuals. 

I.  The  Greeks  had  a  name  epavo^,  which  meant 
a  feast  where  the  viands  were  supplied  by  each  guest 
contributing  in  kind.  If,  in  a  party  of  four,  one 
man  brought  a  ham,  another  a  rabbit,  a  third  a  dish 
of  truffles,  and  a  fourth  a  salmon,  no  one  would 
expect  that,  when  the  cover  was  raised,  there  should 
appear  a  pigeon-pie.  That  would  not  be  in  the 
nature  of  an  epai/09.  Now  not  only  Hobbes  and 
Rousseau,  but  Locke  and  a  great  multitude  of 
modern  Englishmen  with  him,  hold  that  the  power 
of  the  State  is  an  aggregate,  the  algebraic  sum  of 
the  powers  whereof  the  component  members  would 
have  stood  possessed,  had  they  lived  in  what  is 
called,  by  a  misleading  phrase,  "  the  state  of  nature," 


3o8  OF   THE   STATE. 


that  is,  the  condition  of  men  not  subject  to  civil 
authority.  These  powers, — either,  as  Hobbes  and 
Rousseau  virtually  say,  all  of  them,  or,  as  Locke 
and  the  common  opinion  has  it,  only  some  of  them, 
— men  are  supposed  to  resign  as  they  enter  into 
the  State,  If  therefore  there  appears  in  the  City, 
Nation,  State,  or  Commonwealth,  a  certain  new  and 
peculiar  power,  which  belongs  to  no  individual  in 
the  "  state  of  nature,"  or,  as  I  prefer  to  call  it,  the 
extra-civil  state,  then  what  we  may  designate  as 
the  Aggregation  Theory  breaks  down,  and  another 
origin  must  be  sought  of  civil  principality.  But 
there  is  such  a  power  in  the  State,  new  and  peculiar, 
and  not  found  in  any  of  the  component  individuals : 
it  is  the  pov.-er  and  authority  to  punish  on  civil 
grounds.  It  is  the  right  of  the  rods  and  axes,  that 
were  borne  before  the  Roman  magistrate.  It  is,  in 
its  most  crucial  form,  the  right  to  punish  with 
death. 

2.  We  are  not  here  concerned  with  proving  the 
existence  of  this  right.  It  is  generally  admitted : 
we  assume  it  accordingl}',  and  shall  prove  it  later 
on.  Nor  are  we  concerned  with  domestic  punish- 
ment, inflicted  by  the  head  of  a  family  within  his 
own  household,  for  the  good  of  that  household, 
stopping  short  of  any  irrepavahle  harm  to  the  sufferer. 
(St.  Thos.,  2a  2se,  q.  65,  art.  2,  ad.  2.)  Leaving  this 
aside,  we  say,  and  have  proved  already,  that  one 
private  individual  has  no  right  to  punish  another, 
neither  medicinally  for  the  amendment  of  the  delin- 
quent, nor  by  way  of  deterrent  for  the  good  of  the 
community,  nor  in  the  way  of  retrihution  for  his  own 


AGGREGATION   THEORY.  ^09 


satisfaction.  He  has  the  right  of  self-defence,  but 
not  of  punishment  :  the  two  tlunj^^s  are  quite 
different.  lie  may  also  exact  restitution,  where 
restitution  is  due :  but  that  aj^ain  is  not  punishing. 
If  he  is  in  the  extra-civil  state,  he  may  use  force, 
where  prudence  allows  it,  to  recover  what  he  has 
lost.  This  right  of  private  war  really  is  surrendered 
by  the  individual,  when  the  State  is  established : 
but  war  and  punishment  are  two  totally  different 
ideas.  Subjects  are  punished :  war  is  levied  on 
independent  powers.  {Ethics,  c.  ix.,  s.  iii.,  nn.  4 — 6, 
pp.  171 — 174  ;  Natural  Law,  c.  ii.,  s.  ii.,  n.  6,  p.  212.) 

3.  Opposite  is  the  opinion  of  Locke,  who 
writes  : 

"The  execution  of  the  law  of  nature  is  in  that 
state  [of  nature]  put  into  every  man's  hands,  whereby 
every  one  has  a  right  to  punish  the  transgressors  of 
that  law  to  such  a  degree  as  may  hinder  its  viola- 
tion :  for  the  law  of  nature  would,  as  all  other  laws 
that  concern  men  in  this  world,  be  in  vain,  if  there 
were  nobody  that  in  the  state  of  nature  had  a  power 
to  execute  that  law."  We  observe  that  the  punish- 
ment of  offenders  against  the  law  of  nature,  as  such, 
belongs  to  the  Legislator,  who  is  God  alone.  Cer- 
tainly it  is  well,  nay  necessary,  that  there  should  be 
human  law  to  bear  out  the  law  of  nature :  but 
human  law  is  the  creation  of  human  society  in  its 
perfection,  which  is  the  State.  Man  is  punished  by 
man  for  breaking  the  laws  of  man,  not — except 
remotely — for  breaking  the  laws  of  God.  Nor 
would  it  be  any  inconvenience,  if  the  law  of  nature 
were  in  vain  in  a  state  wherein  nature  never  intended 


310  OF  THE   STATE. 


men  to  live,  wherein  no  multitude  of  men  ever  for 
any  notable  time  have  lived,  a  state  which  is  neither 
actual  fact  nor  ideal  perfection,  but  a  mere  property 
of  the  philosophic  stage,  a  broken  article,  an  out- 
worn speculation.  Such  is  "the  state  of  nature," 
as  identified  with  the  extra-civil  state  by  Hobbes, 
Locke,  and  Rousseau. 

Section  III. — Of  the  true  state  of  nature,  which  is  the  state 
of  civil  society;  and  consequently  of  the  divine  origin  of 
poiver. 

I.  The  State  is  defined  by  Aristotle  (PoliticSy 
III.,  ix.,  14):  "the  union  of  septs  and  villages  in 
a  complete  and  self-sufficient  life."  The  first  and 
most  elementary  community  is  the  family,  oIklu. 
A  knot  of  families  associating  together,  claiming 
blood-relationship  and  descent,  real  or  fictitious, 
from  a  common  ancestor,  whose  name  they  bear, 
constitute  a  yevo<i,  called  in  Ireland  a  sept,  in  Scot- 
land a  clan,  nameless  in  England.  When  the  sept 
come  to  cluster  their  habitations,  or  encampments, 
in  one  or  more  spots,  and  to  admit  strangers  in 
blood  to  dwell  among  them,  these  hamlets,  or  camps, 
gradually  reach  the  magnitude  of  a  village.  When 
a  number  of  these  villages,  belonging  to  different 
septs,  come  to  be  contiguous  to  one  another,  this 
mere  juxtaposition  does  not  make  of  them  a  State. 
Nor  does  interchange  of  commodities,  nor  inter- 
marriage, nor  an  offensive  and  defensive  alliance : 
these  are  the  mutual  relations  of  a  confederacy,  ^v/jl- 
fiax^ci,  but  all  these  and  more  are  needed  for  a  State, 
TToXi?.     To  be  a  State,  it  is  requisite  that  these  septs 


d:vine  origin  up  i^oiver. 


3" 


and  villages  should  agree  to  regulate  the  conduct  of 
their  individual  inenibers  by  a  common  standard  of 
social  virtue,  sufficient  for  their  well-being  as  one 
community.  This  conunon  standard  is  fixed  by 
common  consent,  or  by  the  decision  of  some  power 
competent  to  act  for  all  and  to  punish  delinquents. 
The  name  of  this  common  standard  is  law.  {Ethics, 
c.  vii.,  n.  I,  p.  126.)  The  coinnmnity  thus  formed  leads 
a  life  complete  and  sclf-sujficient,  not  being  a  member 
of  another,  but  a  body  by  itself, — not  part  of  any 
ulterior  community,  but  complete  in  the  fulness  of 
social  good  and  social  authority. 

2.  Among  the  ancient  Greeks  and  Italians,  and 
to  some  extent  also  in  mediaeval  Italy  and  Germany, 
the  city  or  municipality,  with  the  small  country 
district  attached,  was  the  State.  With  us  the 
nation  is  the  State ;  and  accordingly  we  say  my 
country  where  the  Greek  said  my  city.  Bearing  this 
difference  in  mind,  as  also  the  fact  that  the  sept  is 
not  known  amongst  us  except  to  antiquarians,  and 
likewise  that  the  village  with  us  coincides  with  the 
parish,  and  that  there  are  town  as  well  as  country 
parishes, — upon  these  modern  data  we  may  amend 
Aristotle's  definition  thus :  The  State  is  the  union  oj 
parishes  and  municipalities  in  a  perfect  and  self-sufficient 
community. 

3.  The  City  State  is  well  illustrated  in  the  follow- 
ing narrative  of  Thucydides  (ii.,  15)  : 

"  In  the  time  of  Cecrops  and  the  early  kings  as 
far  as  Theseus,  Attica  was  always  divided  among 
several  independent  cities,  with  their  own  town-halls 
and  magistrates ;  and  when  there  was  no  alarm  of 


312  OF   THE   STATE. 


an  enemy,  the  inhabitants  did  not  resort  for  common 
dehberation  to  the  King,  but  severally  managed 
their  own  affairs  and  took  their  own  counsel,  and 
some  of  them  even  went  to  war.  But  when  Theseus 
came  to  the  throne,  he  abolished  the  council- 
chambers  and  magistracies  of  the  other  cities,  and 
centralised  all  the  people  in  what  is  now  the  city  [of 
Athens] ,  where  he  appointed  their  one  council- 
chamber  and  town-hall ;  and  while  they  continued 
to  occupy  their  own  properties  as  before,  he  forced 
them  to  recognise  this  as  their  one  city  and  State." 
Attica  before  Theseus  was  a  confederacy,  ^v/xfiaxta, 
not  a  State,  TroXt?. 

4.  A  citizen  is  defined :  **  one  who  has  access  to 
a  share  in  deliberative  and  judicial  functions."  (Ar., 
Pol.  III.,  i.,  12.)  It  is  not  necessary  that  he  actually 
should  share  these  functions,  but  the  way  to  them 
should  lie  open  to  him  :  he  should  be  a  person  quali- 
fied to  share  in  them.  There  are  various  degrees  of 
citizenship.  Under  a  parliamentary  government, 
we  distinguish  the  member  of  parliament,  the  elector, 
and  him  who  v.ill  be  an  elector  as  soon  as  he  gets  a 
house  of  his  own  ;  and  again,  the  judge,  and  him 
who  is  liable  to  serve  on  juries.  In  an  absolute 
monarchy  there  are  no  citizens,  only  subjects. 

5.  "  The  distribution  of  power  in  the  State,  and 
especially  of  the  sovereign  power,  is  called  the 
polity  "  {iToXiTeia,  Ar.,  Pol.,  III.,  vi.,  i), — a  word  im- 
mortalised by  the  judicious  Hooker,  and  happilv 
recovered  recently  to  the  English  language.  The 
polity  then  is  the  distribution  of  the  sovereignty. 
The  person,  singular  or  collective,  in  whose  hand? 


Dn'L\'E    ORIGIN    OF   POWER.  313 


the  full  sovereignty  rests,  is  called  the  rtdcr.  Be  it 
observed  that  what  we  call  the  rtdcr  is  never  one 
man,  except  in  absolute  monarchy.  By  the  theory 
of  the  British  Constitution,  the  ruler  is  King,  Lords, 
and  Commons,  together. 

6.  Nature  requires  that  men  generally  live  in  society, 
domestic  and  civil,  so  that  the  individual  be  of  the  family, 
and  families  form  associations,  which  again  conspire  to 
form  one  perfect  community,  which  is  the  State.  The 
requirement  of  nature  may  be  gathered  from  the 
universal  practice  of  mankind.  "  If  it  (the  word 
savage)  means  people  without  a  settled  form  of 
government,  without  laws  and  without  a  religion, 
then,  go  where  you  like,  you  will  not  find  such  a 
race."  (Max  Miiller,  in  Nineteenth  Century,  Jan.  1S85, 
p.  114.)  The  same  may  be  gathered  from  a  con- 
sideration of  what  the  State  is,  and  of  the  ends 
which  it  serves.  The  State,  as  we  have  seen  (n,  2), 
is  a  union  of  septs  and  villages,  or  of  parishes 
and  municipalities.  The  individual  is  born  and 
nurtured  in  the  family,  and  ordinarily  becomes 
in  time  the  parent  of  a  new  family.  Families 
must  combine  to  form  septs  by  blood,  or  villages 
(or  parishes)  by  locality.  Municipalities  we  may 
leave  aside,  for  a  municipality  is  a  potential  State, 
But  we  must  consider  the  sept,  village,  or  parish, 
w^hich  is  the  community  intermediate  between  family 
and  State.  Among  the  cogent  reasons  which  require 
families  to  enter  into  this  association,  we  may 
mention  friendship,  intermarriage,  the  interchange 
of  services  and  commodities,  the  cultivation  of  the 
arts,  the  preservation  of  traditions  and  inventions. 


314  OF   THE   STATE. 


7.  But  it  is  further  necessary  that  these  septs, 
villages,  or  parishes,  should  band  together  and  com- 
bine to  form  a  higher  community,  self-sufficient  and 
perfect, — for  the  determining  of  rights  which  Natural 
Law  leaves  undetermined, — for  the  punishing  of 
disturbers  of  the  peace,  if  need  be,  even  with  death, 
— for  defence  against  a  common  enemy, — for  a  union 
of  counsels  and  resources  to  the  execution  of  magni- 
ficent works.  This  self-sufficient  and  perfect  com- 
munity, which  is  not  part  of  any  higher  community, 
is  the  State. 

8.  We  may  observe  that  the  whole  reason  for 
the  being  of  the  State  is  not  mutual  need,  nor  the 
repression  of  violence.  Main  reasons  these  are,  no 
doubt,  but  not  the  whole  main  reason.  Even  if  men 
had  no  need  of  one  another  for  the  supply  of  their 
animal  wants,  they  would  still  desire  to  converse  for 
the  satisfaction  of  their  intellectual  curiosity  and 
their  social  affections.  And  even  if  we  had  all  re- 
mained as  void  of  guile,  and  as  full  of  light  and  love, 
as  our  first  parents  were  at  their  creation,  we  should 
still  have  needed  the  erection  of  States.  In  a  State 
there  are  not  only  criminal  but  civil  courts,  w^here  it 
is  not  wicked  men  alone  who  come  to  be  litigants. 
From  sundry  passages  of  Scripture  it  would  appear 
that  even  angels  may  disagree  as  to  what  is  best  and 
proper :  angelic  men  certainly  may  and  do.  It  is 
a  mistake  to  look  upon  civil  government,  with  its 
apparatus  of  laws  and  judgments,  simply  as  a  neces- 
sary evil,  and  remedy  of  the  perverseness  of  man- 
kind. On  the  contrary,  w^ere  all  men  virtuous, 
States  would  still   be  formed,   towering   in  magni- 


DIVINE   ORIGIN   OF  POWER.  315 

ficence  above  the  States  known  to  history,  as  the 
cedars  of  Lebanon  above  the  scanty  growths  of  a 
fell-side  in  our  north  country. 

g.  There  can  be  no  State  ivithout  a  power  to  guide 
and  govern  it.  It  has  indeed  become  the  fashion  to 
repeat,  as  the  latest  discovery  in  politics,  that  what 
a  State  needs  is  not  government  but  administration. 
This  saying  comes  of  a  theory,  to  be  examined  pre- 
sently, that  sovereign  power  abides  permanently 
with  the  people  at  large,  and  that  the  sole  function 
of  princes,  cabinets,  and  parliaments,  is  to  provide 
means  of  giving  effect  to  the  popular  will.  This 
however  is  not  quite  a  repudiation  of  government, 
but  a  peculiar  view  as  to  the  seat  and  centre  of 
government.  Those  who  hold  it,  vigorously  main- 
tain the  right  of  the  Many  to  govern,  control,  and 
command  the  Few.  The  need  of  some  governing 
authority  in  a  State  can  be  denied  by  none  but  an 
Anarchist,  a  gentleman  who  lives  two  doors  beyond 
Rousseau  on  the  side  of  unreason. 

10.  Every  State  is  autonomous,  self-governing,  inde- 
pendent. Either  the  whole  people  taken  collectively 
must  rule  the  same  whole  taken  distributiveh',  or  a 
part  must  rule  the  rest.  The  ruler  is  either  the  whole 
commonwealth,  or  more  frequently  a  part  of  the 
commonwealth.  An  autocrat  is  part  of  the  State 
which  he  governs.  Sovereignty  whole  and  entire  is 
intrinsic  to  the  State.  A  community  that  is  to  any 
extent  governed  from  without,  like  British  India  or 
London,  is  not  a  State,  but  part  of  a  State,  for  it  is 
not  di  perfect  community. 

11.  We    have    it   therefore  that    man   is  a  social 


3i6  OF  THE   STATE. 


animal.  Naturally  he  is  a  member  of  a  family. 
Nature  requires  that  families  should  coalesce  into 
higher  communities,  which  again  naturally  converge 
and  culminate  in  the  State.  Nature  further  requires 
that  in  every  State  there  should  be  an  authority  to 
govern.  But  authority  to  govern  and  duty  to  obey 
are  correlatives.  Nature  therefore  requires  sub- 
mission to  the  governing  authority  in  the  State.  In 
other  words,  Nature  abhors  anarchy  as  being  the 
destruction  of  civil  society,  and  as  cutting  the  ground 
from  under  the  feet  of  civilised  man.  The  genuine 
state  of  nature,  that  state  and  condition,  which 
nature  allows  and  approves  as  proper  for  the  evolu- 
tion of  the  human  faculties,  is  the  state  of  man  in 
civil  society.  That  is  lost  where  there  is  no  judge 
in  the  land. 

12.  There  are  men  full  of  a  sentimental  deference 
to  authority  and  professions  of  obedience,  who  yet 
will  not  obey  any  of  the  authorities  that  actually  are 
over  them.  These  are  disobedient  men.  He  is  an 
anarchist  in  practice,  who  meditates  treason  and  re- 
bellion against  the  "  powers  that  be  "  actually  over 
him  in  the  State  wherein  he  lives.  To  obey  no  actual 
powder  is  to  obey  no  power,  as  to  wear  no  actual 
clothes  is  to  go  naked.  To  keep  up  the  comparison, 
— as  a  man  may  change  his  clothes  upon  occasion, 
and  thus  go  through  a  brief  interval  of  unclothedness 
without  injury  to  health  or  violation  of  decency,  not- 
withstanding the  requirement  of  nature  to  wear 
clothes :  so  it  may  be  or  it  may  not  be  consonant 
with  the  exigency  of  our  nature  at  times  to  subvert 
by  insurrection  the  existing  government  in  order  tc 


DIVINE   ORIGIN   OF  POWER.  31J 

the  substitution  of  a  new  authority ;  that  does  not 
concern  us  here.  We  are  stating  the  general  rule 
under  ordinary  circumstances.  The  submission  to 
civil  authority,  which  nature  requires  of  us,  must  be 
paid  in  the  coin  of  obedience  to  the  actual  estab- 
lished "  powers  that  be." 

13.  Any  one  who  understands  how  morality  comes 
from  God  {Ethics,  c.  vi.,  s.  ii.  nn.  6 — 9,  13,  pp.  119 — 
125),  can  have  no  difficulty  in  seeing  how  civil  power 
is  of  God  also.  The  one  point  covers  the  other.  We 
need  no  mention  of  God  to  show  that  disobedience, 
lying,  and  the  seven  deadly  sins,  are  bad  things  for 
human  nature,  things  to  be  avoided  even  if  they  were 
not  forbidden.  All  the  things  that  God  forbids  are 
against  the  good  of  man.  Their  being  evil  is  dis* 
tinguishable  from  their  being  prohibited,  and  antece- 
dent to  it.  Now  as  drunkenness  and  unchastity  are 
evil  for  man,  so  too  is  anarchy.  The  one  remedy  for 
anarchy  is  civil  government.  Even  if  there  were  no 
God,  it  would  be  still  imperatively  necessary,  as  we 
have  seen,  for  mankind  to  erect  political  institutions, 
and  to  abide  by  the  laws  and  ordinances  of  constitu- 
tional power.  But  t^ere  would  be  no  formal  obligation 
of  submission  to  these  laws  and  ordinances ;  and  re- 
sistance to  this  power  would  be  no  more  than  philoso- 
phic sin.  {Ethics,  c.  vi.,  s.  ii.,  n.  6,  p.  119.)  What  makes 
anarchy  truly  sinful  and  wrong  is  the  prohibition  of  it 
contained  in  the  Eternal  Law,  that  law  where^~y  God 
commands  every  creature,  and  particularly  every  man, 
to  act  in  accordance  with  his  own  proper  being  and 
nature  taken  as  a  whole,  and  to  avoid  what  is  repug- 
nant to  the  same.  {Ethics,  c.  vi.,  s.  ii.,  n.  9,  p.  120.) 


31 8  OF  THE  STATE. 


Therefore,  as  man  is  naturally  social,  and  anarchy  is 
the  dissolution  of  society,  God  forbids  anarchy,  and 
enjoins  obedience  to  the  civil  power,  under  pain  of 
sin  and  damnation.  "  They  that  resist,  purchase  to 
themselves  damnation  "  (Rom.  xiii.  2)  :  where  the 
theological  student,  having  the  Greek  text  before 
him,  will  observe  that  the  same  phrase  is  used  as  in 
I  Cor.  xi.  29  of  the  unworthy  communicant,  as 
though  it  were  the  like  sin  to  rend  our  Lord's 
mystical  Body  by  civil  discord  as  to  profane  His 
natural  Body  by  sacrilege.  But  to  enjoin  obedience 
and  to  bestow  authority  are  the  obverse  and  reverse 
of  one  and  the  same  act.  God  therefore  gives  the 
civil  ruler  power  and  authority  to  command.  This 
is  the  meaning  of  St.  Paul's  teaching  that  there  is 
no  power  but  from  God,  and  that  the  powers  that 
be  are  ordained  of  God.  (Rom.  xiii.  i.) 

14.  The  argument  is  summed  up  in  these  seven 
consequent  propositions : 

(a)  Civil  society  is  necessary  to  human  nature. 

(b)  Civil  power  is  necessary  to  civil  society. 

(c)  Civil  power  is  naught  without  civil  obedience. 

(d)  Civil  obedience  is  necessary  to  human  nature. 

(e)  God  commands  whatever  is  necessary  to 
human  nature. 

(f)  God  commands  obedience  to  the  civil  power. 

(g)  God  commissions  the  civil  power  to  rule. 

15.  If  any  one  asks  how  the  State  and  the  civil 
power  is  of  God  any  otherwise  than  the  railway 
company  with  its  power,  or  even  the  fever  with  its 
virulence,  a  moment's  reflection  will  reveal  the 
answer  in  the   facts,   that  railway  communication, 


VARIETY   OF  POLITIES.  319 

however  convenient,  is  not  an  essential  feature  of 
human  life,  as  the  State  is :  while  diseases  are  not 
requirements  in  order  to  good,  but  incidental  defects 
and  evils  of  nature,  jjcrmitted  by  God.  Why  God 
leaves  man  to  cope  with  such  evils,  is  not  the  ques- 
tion here. 

Readings. — Ar.,    PoL,   I.,   ii. ;    III.,   i. ;  III.,   i.\. 
nn.  5—15. 

Section  IV. — Of  the  Variety  of  Polities. 

1.  One  polity  alone  is  against  the  natural  law ;  that 
is  every  polity  which  proves  itself  unworkable  and  in- 
efficient :  for  the  rest,  various  States  exhibit  various 
polities  workable  and  lawful,  partly  from  the  circum- 
stances, partly  from  the  choice,  of  the  citizens :  but  the 
sum  total  of  civil  power  is  a  constant  quantity,  the  same 
for  all  States.  We  proceed  to  establish  the  clauses 
of  this  statement  in  succession. 

2.  If  a  watch  be  necessary  to  a  railway  guard,  and 
he  is  bound  to  have  one  accordingly,  it  is  also  neces- 
sary, and  he  is  bound  to  procure  it,  that  the  watch 
shall  go  and  keep  time.  A  watch  that  will  not  keep 
time  is  an  unlawful  article  for  him  to  depend  upon, 
being  tantamount  to  no  watch,  whereas  he  is  bound 
to  have  a  watch.  Otherwise,  be  his  watch  large  or 
small,  gold,  silver,  or  pinchbeck,  all  this  is  indif- 
ferent, so  long  as  it  be  a  reliable  timekeeper.  In 
like  manner,  we  must  have  a  State,  we  must  have  a 
government,  and  we  must  have  a  government  that 
can  govern.  Monarchy,  aristocracy,  parliaments, 
wide  or  narrow  franchise,  centralisation,  decentra- 
lisation, any  one  of  these  and  countless  other  forms 


320  OF   THE   STATE. 


— apart  from  the  means  whereby  it  is  set  up — is  a 
lawful  government,  where  it  is  a  workable  one ;  un- 
lawful, and  forbidden  by  God  and  nature,  where  it 
cannot  work.  A  form  of  government  that  from  its 
own  intrinsic  defects  could  nowhere  work,  would  be 
everywhere  and  always  unlawful. 

3.  You  cannot  argue  from  the  accomplished  fact 
the  lawfulness  of  the  means  whereby  it  was  accom- 
plished. Nor  do  we  say  that  every  form  of  govern- 
ment, which  succeeds  in  governing,  was  originally 
set  up  in  justice ;  nor  again  that  the  success  of  its 
rule  is  necessarily  due  to  the  use  of  just  means.  The 
Committee  of  Public  Safety  in  Paris  in  1794  did 
manage  to  govern,  but  it  was  erected  in  blood,  and 
it  governed  by  an  unscrupulous  disregard  of  every- 
body's rights.  All  that  we  say  is,  that  no  distribution 
of  civil  power  as  a  distribution,  or  no  polity  as  a  polity 
(s,  iii.,  n.  5,  p.  312),  is  unlawful,  if  by  it  the  govern- 
ment can  be  carried  on.  And  the  reason  is  plain. 
For  all  that  nature  requires  is  that  there  should  be 
an  efficient  civil  authority,  not  that  this  man  should 
have  it,  or  that  one  man  or  other  should  have  it  all, 
or  that  a  certain  class  in  council  assembled  should 
engross  it,  or  that  all  the  inhabitants  of  the  country 
should  participate  in  it.  Any  one  of  these  arrange- 
ments that  will  work,  satisfies  the  exigency  of  nature 
for  civil  rule,  and  is  therefore  in  itself  a  lawful  polity. 

4.  Working,  and  therefore,  as  explained,  lawful 
polities  are  as  multitudinous  as  the  species  of  animals. 
Besides  those  that  actually  are,  there  is  a  variety 
without  end,  as  of  animals,  so  of  polities,  that  might 
be  and  are  not.     We  can  classify  only  the   main 


VARIETY   OF   POLITIES.  3«« 

types.  We  ground  our  classification  upon  Ar.,  Pol., 
Ill,,  vii.,  modernising  it  so  as  to  take  in  forms  of 
representative  government,  whereof  Aristotle  had 
no  conception. 

(i)  Monarchy,  or  the  rule  of  the  Single  Person, 
in  whose  hands  the  whole  power  of  the  State  is  con- 
centrated, e.g.,  Constantine  the  Great. 

(2)  A  ristocracy,  or  the  rule  of  the  Few,  which  will 
be  either  direct  or  representative,  according  as  either 
they  themselves  by  their  own  votes  at  first  hand,  or 
representatives  whom  they  elect,  make  the  laws. 

(3)  Democracy,  or  the  rule  of  the  Many,  that  is, 
of  the  whole  community.  Democracy,  again,  is  either 
direct  (commonly  called  pure)  or  representative.  The 
most  famous  approach  in  history  to  pure  democracy 
is  the  government  of  Athens,  B.C.  438 — 338. 

(4)  Limited  MonarcJiy. 

(a)  Monarchy  with  Aristocracy,  the  government  of 
England  from  1688  to  1830. 

(b)  Monarchy  with  Democracy. 

5.  All  civil  government  is  for  the  governed,  that 
is,  for  the  community  at  large.  The  perversion  of  a 
polity  is  the  losing  sight  of  this  principle,  and  the 
conducting  of  the  polity  in  the  interest  of  the  govern- 
ing body  alone.  By  such  perversion  monarchy 
passes  into  tyranny,  aristocracy  into  oligarchy,  and 
democracy  into  ochlocracy  or  mob-rule.  It  might 
appear  strange  that,  where  the  power  rests  with  the 
whole  people  collectively,  government  should  ever 
be  carried  on  otherwise  than  in  the  interest  of  the 
entire  community,  did  we  not  remember  that  the 
majority,  with  whom  the  power  rests  in  a  democracy, 

V 


S23  OF  THE  STATE. 


may  employ  it  to  trample  on  and  crush  the  minority. 
Thus  the  Many  may  worry  and  harass  the  Few, 
the  mean  and  poor  the  wealthy  and  noble :  though 
commonly  perhaps  the  worrying  has  been  the  other 
way  about.  Anyhow  it  is  important  to  observe  that 
there  is  no  polity  which  of  itself,  and  apart  from  the 
spirit  in  which  it  is  worked,  is  an  adequate  safeguard 
and  rock  of  defence  against  oppression. 

6.  The  wide  range  of  polities  that  history  pre- 
sents is  not  drawn  out  by  the  caprice  of  nations. 
The  very  fact  of  a  certain  nation  choosing  a  certain 
polity,  where  they  are  free  to  choose,  is  an  indication 
of  the  bent  of  the  national  character,  and  character 
is  not  a  caprice.  No  North  American  population 
are  ever  likely  to  elect  an  absolute  monarch  to 
govern  them.  That  polity  which  thrives  on  the 
shores  of  the  Caspian,  can  strike  no  root  on  the 
banks  of  the  Potomac.  The  choice  of  a  polity  is 
limited  by  the  character  of  the  electors  and  by  the 
circumstances  in  which  the  election  is  made.  Not 
every  generation  in  a  nation  is  free  to  choose  its 
polity  :  but  the  choice  and  institution  of  the  fathers 
binds  the  children.  Up  to  a  certain  point  ancestral 
settlements  must  be  respected,  or  instability  ensues, 
and  anarchy  is  not  far  off.  Thus  the  spirit  of  freedom 
should  always  act  as  Burke  says,  "as  if  in  the  pre- 
sence of  canonized  forefathers." 

7.  The  smallest  State  in  the  world  is  the  little 
republic  of  Andorra  in  the  Pyrenees.  Though  it  be 
a  paradox  to  say  it,  there  is  as  much  political  power 
in  Andorra  as  in  Russia, — one  and  the  same  measure 
of  it  in  every  State.     In  every  State  there  is  power 


VARIETY   OF   POLITIES.  3*3 


for  civil  good  to  the  full  height  of  the  emergencies 
that  may  arise.  The  same  emergencies  may  arise 
everywhere,  and  everywhere  there  is  full  power  to 
see  that  the  commonwealth  take  no  harm  by  them. 
What  a  great  empire  can  do  for  this  purpose,  e.g., 
proclaim  martial  law,  search  houses,  lay  an  embargo 
on  the  means  of  transport,  impress  soldiers,  the 
same  can  the  tiniest  commonwealth  do  in  the  like 
need.  And  the  ordinary  functions  of  government 
are  the  same  in  both. 

8.  This  seems  at  variance  with  the  theory  of 
some  constitutions,  according  to  which  there  are 
certain  so-called  fundamental  laws,  which  the  legis- 
lature cannot  call  in  question,  nor  deal  with  in  any 
way,  but  must  take  them  in  all  its  deliberations  for 
positions  established  and  uncontrovertible.  The 
British  Constitution  recognizes  no  fundamental 
laws.  There  is  no  reform  that  may  not  legally  be 
broached  in  Parliament  and  enacted  there.  Parlia- 
ment is  said  to  be  "  omnipotent,"  "  able  to  do  every- 
thing, except  to  make  a  man  a  woman."  But  in 
many  legislatures  it  is  not  so.  At  Athens  of  old 
there  were  certain  measures  which  no  one  could 
introduce  for  discussion  in  the  Sovereign  Assembly 
without  rendering  himself  liable  to  a  prosecution, 
ypa(f)i]  irapavo/jLcov.  And  there  have  been  many 
monarchs  termed  absolute,  who  yet  were  bound 
by  their  coronation-oath,  or  by  some  other  agree- 
ment with  their  people,  to  preserve  inviolate  certain 
institutions  and  to  maintain  certain  laws.  It  may 
be  contended  that  such  a  government  as  we  have  in 
England,  which  is  theoretically  competent  to  pass 


324  OF  THE  STATE. 


any  law  within  the  limits  of  the  natural  law,  has  a 
greater  range  of  power  than  a  government  whose 
operation  is  limited  by  a  barrier  of  fundamental 
positive  law.  But  this  contention  vanishes  when 
we  observe  that  there  must  remain  in  the  State, 
which  has  fundamental  laws,  a  power  somewhere 
to  reverse  them.  They  can  be  reversed  at  least  by 
the  consent  of  the  whole  people.  Thus  at  Athens 
the  ypacfyrj  irapavo/jicov  could  be  suspended  by  a  vote 
of  the  Assembly.  A  people  can  release  their  monarch 
from  his  coronation-oath  in  such  portions  of  it  as 
are  not  binding  absolutely  by  divine  law.  Where 
fmidamental  law  obtains,  a  portion  of  the  civil  power 
becomes  latent,  and  only  a  diminished  remainder  is 
left  free  in  the  hands  of  the  person  or  persons  who 
are  there  said  to  rule.  Such  person  or  persons 
are  not  the  adequate  rider  of  the  State,  as  they  have 
not  the  full  pov/er,  but  the  people,  with  whom 
rests  the  latent  authority  to  cancel  certain  laws,  are 
to  that  extent  partakers  in  the  sovereignt3\  Where 
there  is  agreement  of  the  whole  people,  great  and 
small,  no  part  of  the  power  remains  latent,  but 
all  is  set  free.  With  us,  it  may  be  observed,  the 
omnipotence  of  parliament  has  become  a  mere 
lawyer's  theory.  On  every  great  issue,  other  than 
that  on  which  the  sitting  parliament  has  been 
elected,  it  is  the  practice  of  ministers  to  "go  to 
the  country"  by  a  new  General  Election.  Thus 
only  a  certain  measure  of  available  authority  is  free 
at  the  disposal  of  parliament :  the  rest  remaining 
latent  in  the  general  body  of  the  electorate.  Such  is 
our  constitution  in  practice. 


VARIETY   OF  POLITIES.  325 

9.  If  in  any  State  the  whole  power  were /rr^  in 
the  hands  of  one  man,  there  we  might  look  to  see 
made  good  the  dictum  of  the  judicious  Hooker 
{Ecclesiastical  Polity^  bk.  i.,  s.  x.,  n.  5) :  "  To  live  by 
one  man's  will  became  the  cause  of  all  men's 
misery."  In  a  monarchy  untrammelled  by  senate 
or  popular  assembly,  it  were  well  that  some  of  the 
sovereign  power  should  remain  latent,  and  that  His 
Majesty  should  rule  in  accordance  with  certain  laws, 
not  within  his  royal  pleasure  to  revoke. 

10.  The  State  and  the  power  of  the  State,  apart 
from  the  polity,  is  of  God.  (s.  iii.,  n.  14,  p.  318.)  The 
State  under  this  or  that  polity  and  this  or  that  ruler, 
is  also  of  God.  But,  apart  from  the  polity,  the  State 
is  of  God  antecedently  to  any  determination  of  any 
human  will :  because,  willy  nilly,  man  must  live  in  civil 
society  and  God  commands  him  so  to  do.  But  the 
State  under  this  polity  and  this  ruler  is  of  God 
consequetitly  to  some  determination  of  human  volition. 
In  this  consequent  sense  we  write  Victoria  Dei  gratia. 

11.  There  is  little  use  in  the  enquiry.  Which  is 
the  best  polity  ?  There  is  no  polity  which  excels 
all  other  polities  as  man  does  the  rest  of  animals. 
We  judge  of  politics  as  of  the  various  types  of 
locomotives,  according  ^o  the  nature  of  the  country 
where  they  are  to  run.  Aristotle  tells  us  that  if  we 
meet  with  a  Pericles,  we  shall  do  best  to  make  him 
our  king,  and  hand  over  all  our  aftairs  to  him.  (Ar., 
Pol.,  III.,  xiii.,  25:  cf.  Thucydidcs,  ii.,  65.)  Other- 
wise, "  for  most  cities  and  for  most  men,  apart  from 
exceptional  circumstances,  or  a  condition  of  ideal 
perfection,  but  having  regard  to  what  is  ordinarily 


i26  OF  THE  STATE. 


possible,"  he  recommends  a  moderate  republic  under 
middle-class  rule.  (Ar.,  Pol.,  VI.,  xi.,  Ed.  Congreve.) 
This  he  calls  par  excellence  *'  a  polity,"  TroXirela. 
Democracy,  Srj^oKparia,  with  Aristotle,  always  means 
that  perversion  of  democracy,  which  we  call  mob- 
rule.  (Ar.,  Pol.,  III.,  vii.,  nn.  3,  5.) 

12.  In  the  English  monarchy  the  whole  majesty 
of  the  State  shines  forth  in  the  Single  Person  who 
wears  the  Crown.  The  Crown  is  the  centre  of 
loyalty  and  gives  dignity  to  the  government.  The 
Crown  is  above  all  parties  in  the  State,  knows  their 
secrets,  their  purposes  when  in  office  as  well  as 
their  acts,  and  is  able  to  mediate,  when  party 
feeling  threatens  to  bring  government  to  a  stand- 
still. The  British  Crown  has  more  weight  of  in- 
fluence than  of  prerogative.^ 

Readings. — St.  Thos.,  la  2ae,  q.  105,  art.  i,  in 
Corp.,  ad  2,  5;  Ar.,  Pol.,  III.,  xv. ;  ib.,  III.,  xvi., 
nn.  5 — 8;  ib.,  VIII.  (al.  V.),  xi.  nn.  i — 3. 


Section  V, — Of  the  Divine  Right  of  Kings  and  the 

Inalienable  Sovereignty  of  the  People. 

I.  "  Those  old  fanatics  of  arbitrary  power  dogma- 
tized as  if  hereditary  monarchy  were  the  only  lawful 
government  m  the  world,  just  as  our  new  fanatics 
of  popular  arbitrary  power  maintain  that  a  popular 
election  is  the  only  lawful  source  of  authority." 
(Burke,  Reflections  on  French  Revolutio7i.) 

V/e  here  stand  between  two  idols  of  the  tribe  of 
politicians.     We  may  call  them  Gog  and  Magog: 

»  Written  in  the  month  and  year  of  Jubilee,  June,  1887. 


DIVINE   RIGHT  OF   KINGS.  327 

Gog,  the  divine  right  of  kings;   Magog,  the  inalien- 
able sovereignty  of  the  people. 

2.  The  position  known  in  history  as  "  the  divine 
right  of  kings  "  may  be  best  described  as  a  political 
popedom.      It    is   the   belief    of    Catholics   that    our 
Divine   Redeemer,   instituting  His  Church   by   His 
own  personal  act  as  a  perfect  society  and  spiritual 
commonwealth,  instituted  in  like  manner  the  polity 
under  which  He  willed  it  to  be  governed,  namely, 
the  Papal  monarchy,  begun  in  St.  Peter  and  carried 
to  completion  according  to  our  Lord's  design  under 
the  line  of  Popes,  Peter's  successors.    The  monarchy 
thus  established  is  essential  to  the  Catholic  Church. 
We  speak  not  here  of  the  temporal  power  which 
the  Pope  once  enjoyed  in  the  Roman  States,  but 
of  his  spiritual  sovereignty  over  all   Christendom 
The  Pope  cannot  validly  resign  and  put  out  of  his 
own  and  his  successors'  hands,  nor  can  the  Cardinals 
take  aw^ay  from  him,  nor  the  Episcopate,  one  jot 
or  tittle  of  this  spiritual  prerogative.    He  cannot,  for 
instance,  condition  his  infallibility  on  the  consent  of 
a  General  Council,  or  surrender  the  canonization  of 
saints  to  the  votes  of  the  faithful  at  large.     Such 
are  the  inalienable,  Christ-given  prerogatives  ol  the 
Papacy.     Henry  VHI.  feloniously  set  himself  up  for 
Pope  within  the  realm  of  England.  Blending  together 
temporal  and  spiritual  jurisdiction,  he  made  out  his 
rights  and  prerogatives  as  a  monarch,  even  in  the 
civil   order,  to   be    inalienable   as    in  the   spiritual. 
Spiritual    and    civil    attributes   together   formed    a 
jewelled    circlet,    one    and    indivisible,    immoveably 
fixed    on    the    brow    of    the    King's    Most    Sacred 


1|2&  OF  THE  STATE. 


Majesty.  Grown  and  swollen  by  their  union  with 
the  spirituality,  the  civil  attributes  of  the  Crown 
were  exaggerated  to  the  utmost,  and  likewise 
declared  inalienable.  They  were  exaggerated  till 
they  came  to  embrace  all  the  powers  of  government. 
The  privileges  of  Parliament,  and  the  limitations 
to  the  royal  authority,  set  forth  in  the  Petition  of 
Right  in  1628,  were  regarded  as  mere  concessions 
tenable  at  the  King's  pleasure :  from  which  pomt 
of  view  we  understand  the  readiness  of  so  con- 
scientious a  monarch  as  Charles  I.  to  act  against 
such  privileges  after  he  had  allowed  them.  But  to 
vest  all  the  powers  of  government  inalienably  in  the 
King,  so  that  whoever  else  m^ay  seem  to  partake  in 
them,  shall  partake  only  by  royal  sufferance,  is  tan- 
tamount to  declaring  monarchy  the  sole  valid  and 
lawful  polity.  This  declaration  the  ministers,  lay  and 
clerical,  of  our  Charleses  and  Jameses  do  not  seem 
to  have  made  in  express  terms.  It  is,  however,  con- 
tained by  implication  in  their  celebrated  phrase  of 
"the  inalienable  prerogatives  of  the  Crown,"  as  in- 
terpreted by  the  stretches  of  prerogative  which  they 
advised.  They  virtually  asserted  of  one  particular 
polity,  or  distribution  of  civil  power  (c.  viii.,  s.  iii.,  n.  5, 
p.  312),  that  which  is  true  only  of  civil  power  taken 
nakedly,  apart  from  the  mode  of  its  distribution — 
they  said  of  monarchy  what  is  true  oi government — that 
the  sum  of  its  power  is  a  constant  quantity  (c.  viii., 
s.  iv.,  n.  7,  p.  322),  and  that  it  is  of  God  antecedently 
to  and  irrespectively  of  any  determination  of  popular 
will.  (c.  viii.,  s.  iv.,  n.  10,  p.  325.) 

3.  Such  a  position  is  easily  refuted,  negatively,  by 


SOVEREIGNTY  OF  THE  PEOPLE.  329 

its  being  wholly  unproven,  unless  the  English  Refor- 
mation, and  the  servile  spirit  in  Church  and  State 
that  promoted  and  was  promoted  by  the  Refor- 
mation, can  pass  for  a  proof;  and  again  the  position 
is  positively  refuted,  when  we  come  to  consider  how 
all  that  nature  requires  and  God  commands,  is 
government  under  some  polity,  not  government 
everywhere  under  monarchy ;  there  being  many 
workable  polities  besides  monarchy,  (s.  iv.,  nn.  i — 4, 

P-  319-) 

4.  The   same    argument   that   demolishes   Gog, 

also  overturns  Magog.  The  two  idols,  opposed  to 
one  another,  stand  upon  the  same  pedestal,  the 
identification  of  government  in  general  with  one 
particular  polity,  as  thous:h  a  polity  were  the  polity. 
The  great  asscrtor  and  worshipper  of  the  inalienable 
sovereignty  of  the  people  is  Jean  Jacques  Rousseau. 
He  starts  from  postulates  which  we  have  already 
rejected — that  all  men  are  equal  (c.  viii.,  s.  i.,  n.  9, 
p.  305) — that  man  is  born  free  {ib.,  n.  10) — that  none 
can  be  bound  to  obey  another  without  his  own  con- 
sent (ib.,  n.  11) — that  civil  society  is  formed  by  an 
arbitrary  convention  (ib.,  n.  4) — which  convention 
is  the  Social  Contract,  {ib.,  n.  5.)  From  these  un- 
reasonable postulates  Rousseau  draws  the  con- 
clusion, logically  enough,  that  the  sovereign  will 
in  every  State  is  the  will  of  the  majority  of  the 
citizens:  but  the  will  of  the  majority,  he  goes  on, 
cannot  be  alienated  from  the  majority  :  therefore 
neither  can  the  sovereignty  be  alienated,  but  must 
abide  permanently  with  the  people  ruling  by  a 
majority  of  votes.     The  argumentation  is  e.xcellcnt, 


Z70  OF  THE  STATE. 


but  the  premisses  are  all  false.  The  conclusion  is 
vastly  popular,  few  minds  considering  from  what 
premisses  it  is  drawn. 

5.  If  sovereignty  rests  inalienably  with  the 
people,  the  one  valid  polity  is  pure  democracy. 
This  proposition,  however,  Rousseau  was  not 
forward  to  formulate.  The  Stuarts  had  shrunk 
from  formulating  a  similar  proposition  about 
monarchy,  though  they  virtually  held  and  acted  upon 
it.  They  were  willing  enough  to  allow  of  a  parlia- 
ment, whose  privileges  and  functions  should  be  at 
His  Majesty's  gracious  pleasure.  Thus  Rousseau 
will  allow  you  to  have  your  senate,  king,  emperor, 
if  you  will :  only  remember  that  he  is  the  prince,  not 
the  sovereign.  {Contrat  Social,  1.  iii.,  c.  i.)  The  people 
collectively  are  the  sovereign,  always  sovereign. 
The  prince,  that  is,  he  or  they  to  whom  the  adminis- 
tration is  entrusted — since  all  the  citizens  cannot 
administer  jointly — is  the  mere  official  and  bailiff 
of  the  Sovereign  People,  bound  to  carry  out  their 
mandate  in  all  things,  and  removable  at  their 
pleasure.  The  people  must  meet  periodically,  not 
at  the  discretion  of  the  prince.  "These  meetings 
must  open  with  two  questions,  never  to  be  omitted, 
and  to  be  voted  on  separately.  The  first  is : 
Whether  it  pleases  the  Sovereign  (People)  to  con- 
tinue the  present  form  of  government.  The  second 
is :  Whether  it  pleases  the  People  to  leave  the 
administration  to  the  persons  at  present  actually 
charged  with  it."  {Contrat  Social,  1.  iv.,  c.  xviii.) 

6.  The  claim  of  a  pure  democracy  like  this  to 
supersede   all   other   polities  cannot  be  established 


SOVEREIGNTY   OF   THE   PEOPLE.  331 

by  abstract  arguments.  That  we  have  seen  in 
examining  the  Social  Contract.  The  alternative 
way  of  establishing  such  an  exclusive  claim  would 
be  to  prove  that  the  practical  efficiency  of  pure 
democracy  immeasurably  transcends  the  efficiency 
of  every  other  possible  polity.  There  is  indeed 
yet  a  third  mode  of  proof  resorted  to.  It  is  said 
that  pure  democracy  everywhere  is  coming  and 
must  come  ;  and  that  what  is  thus  on  the  line  of 
human  progress  must  be  right  and  best  for  the  time 
that  it  obtains.  A  grand  invention  this  of  Positivist 
genius,  the  theory,  that  whatever  is  is  right ;  and 
the  practice,  always  to  swim  with  the  stream ! 
But  supposing  that  pure  democracy  is  coming,  how 
long  is  it  likely  to  last  ?  The  answer  may  be 
gathered  from  a  review  of  the  working  difficulties 
of  such  a  polity. 

7.  It  is  made  only  for  a  small  State.  Railway 
and  telegraph  have  indeed  diminished  the  diffi- 
culty ;  and  have  removed  the  need  of  all  the 
voters  meeting  in  one  place,  as  was  done  at  Athens. 
Newspapers  echo  and  spread  with  addition  the 
eloquence  of  popular  orators,  beyond  the  ears  that 
actually  listen  to  them.  Still,  think  what  it  would 
be  to  have  a  general  election  upon  every  bill  that 
passes  through  Parliament :  for  that  is  what  pure 
democracy  comes  to.  The  plan  would  scarcely 
work  with  a  total  electorate  of  thirty  thousand. 
You  say  the  people  would  entrust  a  committee  with 
the  passing  of  ordinary  measures,  reserving  to  them- 
selves the  supervision.  I  am  not  arguing  the 
physical  impossibility,  but  the  moral  difiiculties  of 


33 i  OF  THE  STATE. 

such  an  arrangement  For  either  the  people  throw 
the  reins  of  government  on  the  neck  of  this  com- 
mittee, or  they  keep  a  tight  hold  upon  the  committee 
and  guide  it.  In  the  former  case  the  popular 
sovereignty  becomes  like  that  of  a  monarch  who 
leans  much  on  favourites,  a  sovereignty  largely 
participated  in  by  others  than  the  nominal  holder 
of  the  control.  On  the  other  hand,  if  the  people  do 
frequently  interfere,  and  take  a  lively  interest  in 
the  doings  of  the  subordinate  assembly,  the  people 
themselves  must  be  a  small  body.  An  active 
governing  body  of  three  hundred  thousand  members 
would  be  as  great  a  wonder  as  an  active  man 
weighing  three  hundred  pounds.  Only  in  a  small 
State  is  that  intense  political  life  possible,  which 
a  pure  democracy  must  live.  There  only,  as 
Rousseau  requires,  can  the  public  service  be  the 
principal  affair  of  the  citizens.  "All  things  con- 
sidered," he  says,  "  I  do  not  see  how  it  is  any 
longer  possible  for  the  Sovereign  (People)  to  pre- 
serve amongst  us  the  exercise  of  his  rights,  if  the 
city  is  not  very  small."  {Contrat  Social,  1.  iii.,  c.  xv.) 
And  the  difficulty  of  size  in  a  democracy  is  aggra- 
vated, if,  as  Socialists  propose,  the  democratic  State 
is  to  be  sole  capitalist  within  its  own  limits.  The 
perfect  sovereignty  of  the  people  means  the  dis- 
ruption of  empires,  and  the  pushing  to  extremity 
of  what  is  variously  described  as  local  governmefit, 
home  rule,  autonomy,  and  decentralisation,  till  every 
commune  becomes  an  independent  State.  But  for 
defence  in  war  and  for  commerce  in  peace,  these 
little  States  must  federate ;  and    federation    means 


SOVEREIGNTY   OF   THE   PEOPTE.  333 

centralisation,  external  control  over  the  majority  at 
home,  restricted  foreign  relations,  in  fact  the  cor- 
ruption of  pure  democracy. 

8.  Again,  the  perfect  sovereignty  of  the  people 
cannot  subsist  except  upon  the  supposition  that  one 
man  is  as  much  a  born  ruler  as  another,  which 
means  a  levelling  down  of  the  best  talent  of  the 
community,  for  that  is  the  only  way  in  which 
capacities  can  be  equalised — a  very  wasteful  and 
ruinous  expedient,  and  one  that  the  born  leaders 
of  the  people  will  not  long  endure.  Then  there  is 
the  proverbial  fickleness  of  democracy,  one  day  all 
aglow,  and  cooled  down  the  next,  never  pursuing 
any  course  steadily,  in  foreign  policy  least  of  all, 
though  there  the  dearest  interests  of  the  State  are 
often  at  stake.  As  one  who  lived  under  such  a 
government  once  put  it :  "  Sheer  democracy  is  of 
all  institutions  the  most  ill-balanced  and  ill  put 
together,  like  a  wave  at  sea  restlessly  tossing  before 
the  fitful  gusts  of  wind  :  politicians  come  and  go, 
and  not  one  of  them  cares  for  the  public  interest, 
or  gives  it  a  thought."  (Quoted  by  Demosthenes, 
Speech  on  the  Embassy,  p.  383  A.)  What  they  do 
care  for  and  think  of  sedulously,  is  pleasing  the 
people  and  clinging  to  office.  In  that  respect  they 
are  the  counterparts  of  the  favourites  who  cluster 
round  the  throne  of  a  despotic  monarch,  and  suck 
up  his  power  by  flattering  him.  Peoples  have  their 
favourites  as  well  as  kings.  To  these  persons,  the 
Cleon  or  Gracchus  of  the  hour,  they  blindly  commit 
the  management  of  their  concerns,  as  the  roi  faineant 
of  old  Prankish  times  left  everything  to  his  Mayor  of 


334  OF  THE  STATE. 


the  Palace,  till  the  Mayor  came  to  reign  in  his 
master's  stead  ;  and  so  has  the  popular  favourite 
ere  now  developed  into  the  military  despot.  Strong- 
minded  kings  of  course  are  not  ruled  by  favourites, 
nor  are  highly  intelligent  and  capable  peoples  :  but 
it  is  as  hard  to  find  a  people  fit  to  wield  the  power 
of  pure  democracy  as  to  find  an  individual  fit  for 
an  absolute  monarch,  especially  where  the  State  is 
large. 

9.  From  all  this  we  conclude  that  the  new- 
fashioned  Magog  of  pure  democracy,  or  the  perfect 
sovereignty  of  the  people,  is  not  to  be  worshipped 
to  the  overthrow  and  repudiation  of  all  other 
polities,  any  more  than  the  old-fashioned  Gog  of 
pure  monarchy,  idolised  by  Stuart  courtiers  under 
the  name  of  "  the  divine  right  of  kings."  Neither 
of  these  is  the  polity  :  each  is  a  polity,  but  not  one 
to  be  commonly  recommended.  The  study  of 
polities  admirably  illustrates  the  Aristotelian  doc- 
trine of  the  Golden  Mean  (Ethics,  c.  v.,  s.  iv.,  p.  77), 
teaching  us  ordinarily  to  affect  limited  monarchy  or 
limited  democracy.  But  as  the  mean  must  ever  be 
chosen  in  relation  to  ourselves,  a  Constantine  or  an 
Athenian  Demos  may  represent  the  proper  polity  in 
place  under  extraordinary  circumstances. 

Reading. — The  Month  for  July,  1886,  pp.  338,  seqq 

Section  VI. — Of  the  Elementary  and  Original  Polity, 

I.  **  All  things  are  double,  one  against  another." 
(Ecclus.  xlii.  25.)  The  son  of  Sirach  may  have  had 
in  view  the  human  body  as  divisible  by  a  vertical 
median  line  into  two  symmetrical  halves.     But   in 


ELEMENTARY  AND   ORIGINAL  POLITY.  335 

each  of  the  halves  thus  made,  the  same  organ  or 
hmb  is  never  repeated  twice  in  exact  Hkeness,  nor 
do  any  two  parts  render  exactly  the  same  service. 
This  variety  of  organs  in  the  bodies  of  the  higher 
animals  is  called  differentiation.  As  we  descend  in 
the  animal  series  we  find  less  and  less  of  differentia- 
tion, till  we  reach  the  lowest  types,  which  are  little 
more  than  a  mere  bag,  whence  their  name  of 
Ascidians.  In  that  State  which  has  London  for 
its  capital  city,  we  behold  one  of  the  highest  types 
of  political  existence.  Sovereignty  is  there  divided, 
as  usual  in  modern  States,  into  three  branches. 
Legislative,  Judicial,  and  Executive.  Each  of  these 
branches  is  shared  among  many  persons  in  various 
modes  and  degrees,  so  that  in  practice  it  is  not  easy 
to  enumerate  and  specify  the  holders  of  sovereignty, 
nor  to  characterize  so  complex  a  polity.  At  the  other 
end  of  the  scale  we  may  represent  to  ourselves  250 
"squatters"  forming  an  independent  State  in  the 
far  West  of  America.  They  are  a  pure  democracy, 
and  the  sovereignty  belongs  to  them  all  jointly.  Is 
a  man  to  be  tried  for  his  life  ?  The  remaining 
249  are  his  judges.  Is  a  tax  to  be  levied  on  ardent 
spirits  ?  The  250  vote  it.  Is  there  a  call  to  arms  ? 
The  250  marshal  themselves  to  war.  That  clearly 
is  the  condition  of  minimum  differentiation,  where 
one  citizen  is  in  all  political  points  the  exact  counter- 
part of  all  the  rest.  Of  all  polities  it  is  the  most 
simple  and  elementary  possible.  And  so  far  forth  as  the 
natural  order  of  evolution  in  polities,  as  in  all  other 
things,  is  from  simple  to  compound,  this  is  also  the 
original  polity.     It  is  also  the  residuary  polity,  that, 


336  OP  THE   STATE. 


namely,  which  comes  to  be,  when  all  other  govern- 
ment in  the  State  vanishes.  Thus,  if  the  Powder 
Plot  had  succeeded,  and  King  James  I.,  with  the 
royal  family,  Lords  and  Commons,  with  the  judges 
and  chief  officers  of  the  Executive,  had  all  perished 
together,  the  sovereign  authority  in  England  would 
have  devolved  upon  the  nation  as  a  whole. 

2.  Certain  monarchical  writers  shrink  from  the 
recognition  of  pure  democracy  as  either  the  first  or 
the  last  term  of  the  series  of  polities.  They  do  not 
recognize  it  as  a  polity  at  all.  When  there  is  no 
governing  body  distinct  from  the  mass  of  people  at 
large,  a  government  must  be  formed,  they  say,  by 
popular  suffrage.  Meanwhile,  according  to  them, 
the  sovereign  power  rests  not  with  the  body  of 
electors :  either  it  is  not  yet  created,  or  it  has 
lapsed :  but  as  soon  as  the  election  is  made,  they 
see  sovereignty  breaking  forth  like  the  sun  rising,  in 
the  person,  single  or  composite,  who  is  the  object  of 
the  people's  choice.  This  would  be  the  correct  view 
of  the  matter,  if  no  choice  were  left  to  the  electors, 
but  they  were  obliged  to  acquiesce  in  some  pre- 
arranged polity,  as  a  Monarchy,  or  a  Council  of 
Ten,  and  could  do  nothing  more  than  designate  the 
Monarch  or  the  Council.  Under  such  a  restriction 
the  Cardinals  elect  the  Pope.  But  our  electors  can 
institute  any  polity  they  see  fit.  They  are  a  Con- 
stituent Assembly.  They  may  fix  upon  a  monarchy 
or  a  republic,  two  or  one  legislative  chambers,  a 
wide  or  a  narrow  franchise,  home  rule  or  centraliza- 
tion :  or  they  may  erect  a  Provisional  Government 
for  five  years  with  another  appeal  to  the  people  at 


ELEMENTARY   AND   ORIGINAL   POLITY.  337 

the  end  of  that  term.  More  than  that.  They  could 
impose  a  protective  duty  upon  corn,  or  endow  the 
Roman  Catholic  religion,  making  such  protection  or 
endowment  a  fundamental  law  (s.iv.,n.  8,  p.  323),  and 
withholding  from  the  government,  which  they  pro- 
ceed to  set  up,  the  power  of  meddling  with  that 
law.  They  are  then  not  only  a  Constituent  but 
likewise  a  Legislative  Assembly.  But  this  power  of 
making  laws  and  moulding  the  future  constitu- 
tion of  the  State,  what  else  is  it  but  sovereign 
power,  and  indeed  the  very  highest  manifestation 
of  sovereignty? 

3.  So  far  we  follow  Suarez  in  his  controversy 
with  James  I.  The  natural  order  of  evolution  cer- 
tainly is,  that  the  State  should  be  conceived  in  pure 
democracy,  and  thence  develop  into  other  polities. 
But  in  speaking  as  though  the  natural  order  had 
always  been  the  actual  order,  Suarez  seems  to  have 
been  betrayed  by  the  ardour  of  controversy  into  the 
use  of  incorrect  expressions.  It  is  true  in  the 
abstract,  as  he  says,  that  "  no  natural  reason  can  be 
alleged  why  sovereignty  should  be  fixed  upon  one 
person,  or  one  set  of  persons,  rather  than  upon 
another,  short  of  the  whole  community."  This 
is  true,  inasmuch  as  in  the  abstract  we  view  men  as 
men,  in  which  specific  character  they  are  all  equal. 
But  in  the  concrete  and  real  life,  the  primeval 
citizens  who  start  a  commonwealth  are  rarely  alike 
and  equal,  as  the  founders  of  the  American  Republic 
at  the  separation  from  Great  Britain  pretty  well 
were,  but  some  men,  or  some  order  of  men,  will  so 
much  excel  the  rest  in  ability,  position,  or  posses- 
w 


338  OF  THE  STATE. 

sions,  that  the  rest  have  really  no  choice  but 
to  acquiesce  in  those  gifted  hands  holding  the 
sovereignty. 

Readings. — Suarez,  De  Legibus,  III.,  iii.,  6;  ib., 
III.,  iv.,  nn.  2,  3,  4 ;  Defcnsio  Fidei,  III.,  ii.,  nn.  7, 
8,  9 ;  Ar.,  Pol.,  III.,  xiv.,  12  ;  ib.,  VIII.,  x.,  nn.  7,  8  ; 
The  Month  for  July,  1886,  pp.  342 — 345. 

Section  VII. — Of  Resistance  to  Civil  Poiver. 

"  When  they  say  the  King  owes  his  crown  to  the 
choice  of  his  people,  they  tell  us  that  they  mean  to 
say  no  more  than  that  some  of  the  King's  pre- 
decessors have  been  called  to  the  throne  by  some 
sort  of  choice.  Thus  they  hope  to  render  their 
proposition  safe  by  rendering  it  nugatory."  (BurkC; 
Reflections  on  French  Revolution.) 

1.  The  great  question  about  civil  power  is,  not 
whence  it  first  came  in  remote  antiquity,  but  whence 
it  is  now  derived  and  flows  continually  as  from  its 
source,  whether  from  the  free  consent  of  subjects  so 
long  as  that  lasts,  or  whether  it  obtains  indepen- 
dently of  their  consent.  Can  subjects  overthrow 
the  ruler,  or  alter  the  polity  itself,  as  often  as  they 
have  a  mind  so  to  do  ?  or  has  the  rnler  a  right  to 
his  position  even  against  the  will  of  his  people  ?  A 
parallel  question  is,  can  a  province  annexed  to  an 
empire  secede  when  it  chooses,  as  South  Carolina 
and  other  Confederates  once  attempted  secession 
from  the  American  Union  ? 

2.  These  questions  raise  two  totally  different 
issues,  which  must  be  first  carefully  distinguished 
and  then   severally  answered.     The  first    point   at 


RESISTANCE   TO   CIVIL   POWER.  339 

issue  is  whether  subjects  may  dethrone  their  ruler, 
a  people  alter  their  polity,  or  a  province  secede 
from  an  empire,  at  discretion.  The  second  point  is, 
whether  the  same  may  be  done  under  pressure  of  dire 
injustice.  One  little  matter  of  phraseology  must  be 
rectified  before  an  answer  is  returned  to  this  first 
point.  The  question  whether  subjects  may  dethrone 
their  ruler  at  discretion,  from  the  terms  in  which  it 
is  drawn,  can  lead  to  none  but  a  negative  answer. 
From  the  fact  that  they  are  subjects,  and  this  man, 
or  this  body  of  men,  their  ruler,  their  allegiance 
cannot  be  wholly  discretionary.  That  sovereign  is 
a  mere  man  of  straw,  there  is  no  soul  and  substance 
of  sovereign  power  in  him,  who  maybe  knocked  down 
and  carted  away  for  rubbish,  any  moment  his  so- 
called  subjects  please.  Rousseau  is  quite  clear  on  this 
point.  The  true  debateable  form  of  the  question  is, 
whether  the  people,  being  themselves  sovereign,  can 
remove  at  will  the  official  persons  who  actually  admin- 
ister the  State ;  whether  they  can  change  the  polity, 
and  whether  the  inhabitants  of  a  province  can  secede. 
The  answer  now  is  simple :  all  depends  upon  the 
polity  of  the  particular  country  where  the  case  comes 
for  discussion.  And  if  so  it  be  that  the  constitution 
makes  no  provision  one  way  or  another,  any  dispute 
that  may  occur  must  be  settled  by  amicable  arrange- 
ment among  the  parties  concerned  :  if  they  cannot 
amicably  agree,  they  must  fight.  To  save  this  last 
eventuality,  it  were  well  that  any  claim  which  the 
people  in  any  country  may  have  to  remove  princes 
and  statesmen  from  office,  to  alter  the  polity,  or  to 
divide  the  empire,  should  be  made  matter  of  the 


340  OF  THE  STATE. 


clearest  understanding  and  most  express  and  un- 
ambiguous stipulation.  Even  so,  such  a  provision 
must  be  generally  viewed  with  disfavour  by  the 
political  philosopher,  seeing  how  it  tends  to  the 
weakening  and  undermining  of  government ;  whereas 
the  same  considerations  that  make  out  government 
to  be  at  all  a  boon  and  a  necessity  to  human  nature, 
argue  incapacity  and  instability  in  the  governing 
power  to  be  a  deplorable  evil.  We  must  add,  that 
where  the  people  keep  in  their  hands  any  power  to 
alter  the  polity,  or  transfer  the  administration  to 
other  hands,  there  they  hold  part  at  least  of  the 
sovereignty ;  and  the  alteration  or  transference  is 
effected  by  them,  not  as  subjects,  but  as  partial  ruler. 
3.  The  second  point  we  raised  was,  whether  a 
dethronement,  or  an  alteration  of  polity,  or  a  seces- 
sion, may  be  brought  about,  not  indeed  at  discretion 
for  any  cause,  but  under  pressure  of  dire  injustice. 
It  comes  to  this :  May  the  civil  power  be  resisted 
when  it  does  grievous  wrong?  Let  us  begin  our 
reply  with  another  question  :  May  children  strike 
their  parents  ?  No.  Not  even  in  self-defence  ?  when 
the  parent  is  going  about  to  do  the  child  some 
grievous  bodily  hurt  ?  That  is  an  unpleasant  ques- 
tion, but  the  answer  is  plain.  We  can  make  no 
exceptions  to  the  rule  of  self-defence.  Self-defence 
in  extreme  cases  may  raise  the  arm  of  a  child 
against  its  parent :  in  a  similar  extremity  it  may  set 
a  people  in  conflict  with  their  civil  ruler.  Still  we 
regard  with  horror  the  idea  of  striking  a  parent, 
and  speak  of  it  generally  as  a  thing  never  to  be 
done :  so  should  we  regard  and  speak  of  rebellion. 


RESISTANCE    TO   CIVIL    POWER.  341 

We  should  not  parade  it  before  men's  eyes  as  a 
deed  to  be  contemplated,  admired,  and  readily  put 
in  execution,  "  I  confess  to  you,  Sir,"  writes  Burke, 
"  I  never  liked  this  continual  talk  of  resistance  and 
revolution,  or  the  practice  of  making  the  extreme 
medicine  of  the  constitution  its  daily  bread." 

4.  The  conditions  under  which  the  civil  authority 
may  be  withstood  in  self-defence,  are  fairly  stated  in 
the  Dublin  Revieu>  for  April,  1865,  p.  292.  We  must 
premise,  that  such  a  course  of  self-defence  once 
publicly  entered  upon  is  like  a  rock  rolled  over  the 
brow  of  a  steep  mountain :  down  it  rolls  and  re- 
bounds from  point  to  point,  gathering  momentum  in 
the  descent,  till  in  the  end  the  ruler,  once  defied,  has 
to  be  dethroned,  the  polity  subverted,  the  empire 
rent,  or  they  who  made  the  resistance  must  perish. 

"  Resistance  is  lawful : — (i)  When  a  government 
has  become  substantially  and  habitually  tyrannical, 
and  that  is  when  it  has  lost  sight  of  the  common 
good,  and  pursues  its  own  selfish  objects  to  the 
manifest  detriment  of  its  subjects,  especially  where 
their  religious  interests  are  concerned.  (2)  When 
all  legal  and  pacific  means  have  been  tried  in  vain 
to  recall  the  ruler  to  a  sense  of  his  duty.  (3)  When 
there  is  a  reasonable  probability  that  resistance 
will  be  successful,  and  not  entail  greater  evils  than 
it  seeks  to  remove.  (4)  When  the  judgment  formed 
as  to  the  badness  of  the  government,  and  the 
prudence  of  resistance  thereto,  is  not  the  opinion 
only  of  private  persons  or  of  a  mere  party :  but  ia 
that  of  the  larger  and  better  portion  of  the  people,  so 
that  it  may  morally  be  considered  as  the  judgment 
of  the  community  as  a  whole."    ■ 


34*  OF   THE   STATE. 

5.  Side  by  side  with  this  we  will  set  the  teaching 
of  Leo  XIII.,  Encyclical,  Quod  Apostolici. 

"  If  ever  it  happens  that  civil  power  is  wielded 
by  rulers  recklessly  and  beyond  all  bounds,  the 
doctrine  of  the  Catholic  Church  does  not  allow  of 
insurgents  rising  up  against  them  by  independent 
action  (proprio  marte),  lest  the  tranquillity  of  order 
be  more  and  more  disturbed,  or  society  receive 
greater  injury  thereby :  and  when  things  are  come 
to  such  a  pass  that  there  appears  no  other  ray  or  hope 
of  preservation,  the  same  authority  teaches  that  a 
remedy  must  be  sought  in  the  merits  of  Christian 
patience  and  in  earnest  prayers  to  God." 

The  words  we  have  italicized  seem  to  point  to 
conditions  (4)  and  (3)  respectively,  as  laid  down  by 
the  writer  in  the  Dublin  Review. 

For  an  instance  of  a  king  dethroned,  not  proprio 
marte,  but  with  every  appearance  at  least  of  an  act 
of  the  whole  nation,  see  the  dethronement  of 
Edward  II.,  as  related  by  Walsingham,  Historia 
Anglicana,  I.,  pp.  186,  1S7,  Rolls  Series. 

6.  "  We  save  ourselves  the  more  virulent  and 
destructive  diseases  of  revolution,  sedition,  and  civil 
war,  by  submitting  to  the  milder  type  of  a  change  of 
ministry.  {Times,  April  7,  1S80.) 

7.  It  is  not  monarchical  governments  alone  that 
can  ever  be  resisted  lawfully :  but  what  is  sauce  for 
the  king's  goose  is  sauce  also  for  the  people's 
gander.  There  is  no  special  sanctity  attaching  to 
democracy. 

It  might  seem  that,  since  resistance  requires  to 
be  justified   by    the   approval  of  '*  the   larger   and 


RIGHT  OF  THE  SWORD.  343 

\, 

better  portion  of  the  people"  (n.  4,  condition  [4]) 
no  just  resistance  can  ever  be  offered  to  the  will  of 
the  democratic  majority.  But  the  said  majority 
may  be  in  divers  ways  coerced  and  cajoled,  a  mere 
packed  majority,  while  the  malcontents  may  be,  if 
not  "the  larger,"  clearly  "the  better"  portion  of 
the  community,  (s.  iv.,  n.  5,  p.  321.) 

Readings. — St.  Thos.,  De  Regimine  Principum, 
i.,  6 ;  2a  2te,  q.  42,  art.  2  ;  2a  2ae,  q,  69,  art.  4,  in 
Corp. ;  Locke,  Of  Civil  Government,  nn.  200,  20T,  203, 
204,  208,  209,  223,  224,  225,  227,  229,  230,  232. 

Section  VIII. — Of  the  right  of  the  sword. 

1.  By  the  right  of  the  sword  is  technically  meant 
the  right  of  inflicting  capital  punishment,  according 
to  the  Apostle's  words  :  "  But  if  thou  do  that  which 
is  evil,  fear :  for  he  beareth  not  the  sword  in  vain." 
(Rom.  xiii.  4.)  We  commonly  call  it  the  power  of 
life  and  death. 

2.  That  a  government  may  be  a  working  govern- 
ment, as  it  should  be  (s.  iv.,  n.  2,  p.  319),  it  must  not 
only  make  laws,  but  bear  out  and  enforce  its  legislation 
by  the  sanction  of  punishment.  "  If  talk  and  argu- 
mentation were  sufficient  to  make  men  well-behaved, 
manifold  and  high  should  be  the  reward  of  talkers. 
.  .  .  But  in  fact  it  appears  that  talking  does  very 
well  to  incite  and  stimulate  youths  of  fine  mind  ; 
and  lighting  upon  a  noble  character  and  one  of 
healthy  tastes,  it  may  dispose  such  a  person  to  take 
up  the  practice  of  virtue :  but  it  is  wholly  unable  to 
move  the  multitude  to  goodness ;  for  it  is  not  their 
nature  to  obey  conscience,  but  fear,  nor  to  abstain 


344  OF   THE   STATE. 


from  evil  because  it  is  wrong,  but  because  of  punish- 
ments.     The  multitude  Hve  by  feeling:  they  pursue 
the  pleasures  that  they  like  and  the  means  thereto, 
and  shun  the  opposite  pains,  but  they  have  no  idea, 
as  they  have  had  no  taste,  of  what  is  right  and  fair 
and  truly  sv/eet.  .  .  .  The  m.an  who  lives  by  feeling 
will  not  listen  to  the  voice  of  reason,  nor  can  he 
appreciate  its  warning.     How  is  it  possible  to  divert 
such  a  one  from  his  course  by  argument  ?     Speaking 
generally,  we  say  that  passion  yields  not  to  argu- 
ment but  to  constraint.  .  .  .  The  multitude  obey  on 
compulsion  rather  than  on  principle,  and  from  fear 
of  pains  and  penalties  rather  than  from  a  sense  ol 
right.     These  are  grounds  for  believing  that  legis- 
lators, while  exhortmg  to  virtue  and  putting  certain 
courses  of  conduct  forward  as  right  and  honourable, 
in  the  expectation  that  good  men  will  obey  the  call, 
as  their  habits  lead  them,  should  at  the  same  time 
inflict    chastisements    and    punishments    upon    the 
crossgrained   and   disobedient;    and  as   for  the  in- 
curably  vicious,   put    them    beyond    the   pale   alto- 
gether.    The    result  will   be,  that  the    decent    and 
conscientious    citizen    will    listen    to    the   voice   of 
reason,   while    the  worthless  votary  of  pleasure  is 
chastened  by  pain  like  a  beast  of  burden.  .  .  .  Law 
has  a  coercive  function,  appealing  to  force,  notwith- 
standing that  it  is  a  reasoned  conclusion  of  practical 
wisdom  and  intelligence.    The  interference  of  persons 
Is  odious,  when   it   stands  out   against  the  tide  of 
passion,  even  where  it  is  right  and  proper  to  inter- 
fere ;  but  no  odium  attaches  to  statute  law  enjoining 
the  proper  course."  (Aristotle,  Ethics,  X.,  ix.) 


RIGHT   OF   TH$   SIVORD.  345 


3.  Aristotle  seems  hard  upon  the  masses,  hkening 
them  to  brutes  who  must  be  governed  by  the  whip. 
He  may  be  supjposcd  to  speak  from  experience  of 
the  men  of  his  time.  If  humanity  has  somewhat 
improved  in  two  and  twenty  centuries,  yet  it  cannot 
be  contended  that  the  whip  is  grown  unnecessary 
and  beyond  the  whip  the  sword.  But  we  must 
observe  a  certain  modus  operandi  of  punishment 
which  Aristotle  has  not  noted,  a  more  human  mode 
than  the  terror  of  slavish  fear.  Just  punishment, 
felt  as  such,  stimulates  the  conscience  to  discern 
and  abhor  the  crime.  Men  would  think  little  of 
outraging  their  own  nature  by  excess,  did  they  not 
know  that  the  laws  of  God  and  man  forbid  such 
outrage.  Again,  they  would  think  little  even  of  those 
laws,  were  not  the  law  borne  out  by  the  sanction  of 
punishment.  A  law  that  may  be  broken  with  im- 
punity is  taken  to  be  the  toying  of  a  legislator  not 
in  earnest.  Men  here  are  as  children.  A  child  is 
cautioned  against  lying.  He  reckons  little  of  the 
caution:  he  tells  a  lie,  and  a  flogging  ensues.  There- 
upon his  mind  reverts  to  what  he  was  told  :  he  sees 
that  the  warning  was  meant  in  earnest.  He  reflects 
that  it  must  have  been  a  wicked  thing,  that  lie 
which  his  father,  the  object  of  his  fond  reverence, 
chastises  so  sternly.  If  the  thing  had  been  let 
pass,  he  would  scarcely  have  regarded  it  as  wicked. 
Next  time  he  is  more  on  his  guard,  not  merely 
because  he  fears  a  beating,  but  because  he  under- 
stands better  than  before  that  lying  is  wrong.  The 
awe  in  which  grown-up  people  stand  of  "  a  red 
judge,"  is  not  simple  fear,  like  that  which  keeps  the 


346  OF  THE  STATE. 


wolf  from  the  flock  guarded  by  shepherds  and  their 
dogs  :  but  they  are  alarmed  into  reflection  upon  the 
evil  which  he  is  God's  minister  to  avenge,  and  they 
are  moved  to  keep  the  law,  "  not  only  for  wrath, 
but  for  conscience  sake."  From  this  we  see  that 
for  punishment  to  be  really  salutary,  its  justice  must 
be  manifest  to  the  culprit,  or  to  the  lookers  on,  at 
least  in  their  cooler  moments.  A  punishment  the 
justice  of  which  is  not  discernible,  may  quell  for  the 
moment,  but  it  does  not  moralise,  nor  abidingly 
deter.  There  must  be  an  apparent  proportion 
between  the  offence  and  the  punishment.  A  Dra- 
conian code,  visiting  petty  offences  with  the  severity 
due  to  high  misdemeanours,  is  more  of  an  irritant 
than  a  repressor  of  crime,  because  it  goes  beyond 
men's  consciences. 

4.  There  is  in  every  human  breast  a  strong  sense 
of  what  the  learned  call  lex  talionis,  and  children  tit 
for  tat.  "  If  a  man  has  done  to  him  what  he  has 
done  to  others,  that  is  the  straight  course  of  justice  ;  " 
so  says  the  canon  of  Rhadamanthus,  quoted  by 
Aristotle.  (Eth.,  V.,  v.,  3.)  We  have  argued  the  fun- 
damental correctness  of  this  rule.  {Ethics,  c.  ix.,  s.  iii., 
n.  2,  p.  169.)  It  appears  in  the  divine  direction  given 
to  Noe  :  "  Whoso  sheddeth  man's  blood,  his  blood 
shall  be  shed."  (Gen.  ix.  6.)  It  appears  in  that 
popular  sentiment,  which  in  some  parts  of  America 
displays  itself  in  the  lynching  of  murderers,  who 
have  unduly  escaped  the  hands  of  the  law ;  and 
which,  under  a  sim.ilar  paralysis  of  law  in  Corsica, 
broke  out  in  blood-feuds,  whereby  the  nearest  rela- 
tive of  the  deceased  went  about  to  slay  the  murderer. 


RIGHT  OF   THE   SWORD.  it,! 

Such  taking  of  justice  into  private  hands  is  morally 
unlawful,  as  we  have  proved.  {Ethics,  c.  ix.,  s.  iii., 
n.  4,  p.  171  ;  Natural  Laiv,  c.  viii.,  s.  ii.,  nn.  2,  3, 
pp.  308,  309.)  It  is  a  violent  outburst  of  a  natural 
and  reasonable  sentiment  deprived  of  its  legitimate 
vent.  Unquestionably  then  there  is  an  apparent  and 
commonly  recognized  fairness  of  retribution  in  the 
infliction  of  capital  punishment  for  murder.  Thus 
the  first  condition  of  appropriate  punishment  is 
satisfied,  that  it  be  vuinifestly  proportioned  to  the  crime. 

5.  Capital  punishment  is  moreover  expedient,  nay, 
necessary  to  the  State.  The  right  to  inflict  it  is  one 
of  the  essential  prerogatives  of  government,  one  of 
those  prerogatives  the  sum  of  which,  as  we  have  seen, 
is  a  constant  quantity  everywhere,  (s.  iv.,  n.  7,  p.  322). 
No  Government  can  renounce  it.  The  abolition  of 
capital  punishment  by  law  only  makes  the  power  of 
inflicting  it  latcn'  in  the  State  (s.  iv.,  n.  8,  p.  323) ; 
it  does  not  and  cannot  wholly  take  the  power  away. 
You  ask :  Is  there  not  hope,  that  if  humanity  goes 
on  improving  as  it  has  done,  capital  punishment 
will  become  wholly  unnecessary  ?  I  answer  that — 
waiving  the  question  of  the  prospect  of  improve- 
ment— in  a  State  mainly  consisting  of  God-fearing, 
conscientious  men,  the  infliction  of  capital  punish- 
ment would  rarely  be  necessary,  but  the  pOK'cr  to  inflict 
it  could  never  be  dispensed  with.  If  men  ever 
become  so  ideally  virtuous,  the  right  of  the  State  to 
visit  gross  crime  with  death  cannot  hurt  them,  and 
it  will  strengthen  their  virtue,  as  all  human  social 
virtue  will  ever  need  strengthening. 

6.  The  abiding  necessity  of  this  right  0/  the  sword 


348  OF  THE  STATE. 


IS   argued  from  the  strength  and  frequency  of  the 

provocations   to    deeds   of  bloodshed    and   violence 
that  must  ever  be  encountered    in    human   society. 
What  these  provocations  are,  how  many  and   how 
strong,  may  be  left  to  the  reflection  of  the  student 
who  reads  his  newspaper,  or  even  his  novel.     Not 
the   least   appalling    thing    about    crime,    atrocious 
crime  especially,  is  the    example  that   it    gives  and 
the  imitators  whom  it  begets.     It  is  not  merely  that 
it    sets   the   perpetrator   himself  on  the  downward 
path,  so  that,  unless  detected  and  punished,  a  man's 
first  deed  of  blood  is  rarely  his  last  :   it  draws  others 
after  him  by  a  fatal  fascination.     Like  the  images 
which    the    Epicureans  supposed  all  visible  objects 
to    slough    off  and  shed  into  the  air  around  them, 
such   phantoms   and    images  of  guilt  float  about  a 
great  crime,  enter   into   the    mind  of  the  spectator 
and  of  the  hearer,  and  there,  upon  slight  occasion, 
turn  to  actual  repetitions  of  the  original  deed.     The 
one  preventive  is  to  append  to  that  deed  a  punish- 
ment, the  image  of  which  shall  also  enter  into  the 
mind,  excite  horror,  and  disenchant   the   recipient. 
This  is  not  to  be  done  by  mere  banishment  of  the 
criminal,  nor  by  his  perpetual  incarceration.     Exile 
and  prison — particularly  in  view  of  the  humanity  of 
a  modern  penitentiary — do  not  sufficiently  strike  the 
imagination.     One  sweet  hour  of  revenge  will  ofter 
appear  cheap  at  the  price  of  ten  years'  penal  servi- 
tude.    There  is  nothing  goes  to  the  heart  like  death. 
Death  is  the  most  striking  of  terrors  ;    it  is  also  the 
penalty  that  most  exactly  counterpoises  in  the  scales 
of  justice   the   commission  of  a  murderous  crime. 


RIGHT   OF  THE  SWORD  •       349 

All  States  need  this  dread  figure  of  the  Sword-bearer 
standing  at  the  elbow  of  the  Sovereign. 

7.  But  is  not  every  capital  sentence  a  trespass 
upon  the  dominion  of  God,  Lord  of  life  and  death  ? 
No,  for  that  same  God  it  is  who  has  endowed  man 
with  a  nature  that  needs  to  grow  up  in  civil  society, 
which  civil  society  again  needs  for  its  maintenance 
the  power  to  make  laws,  to  sit  in  judgment  on 
transgressors,  and  in  extreme  cases,  as  we  have 
proved,  having  tried  them  and  found  them  guilty, 
to  take  away  even  their  lives,  to  the  common  terror 
and  horror  of  the  crime.  God,  who  wills  human 
nature  to  be,  wills  it  to  be  on  the  terms  on  which 
alone  it  can  be.  To  that  end  He  has  handed  over 
to  the  civil  ruler  so  much  of  His  own  divine  power 
of  judgment,  as  shall  enable  His  human  delegate  to 
govern  with  assurance  and  effect.  That  means  the 
right  of  the  sword. 

8.  It  may  be  objected  that  to  kill  any  man  is 
to  treat  him  as  a  thing,  not  a  person,  as  an  hetero- 
ceniric,  not  an  autoceniric  being,  which  is  a  proceeding 
essentially  unnatural  and  wrong,  (c.  ii.,  s.  i.,  n.  2,  p. 
203.)  St. Thomas's  answer  here  is  peculiarly  valuable: 

"  Man  by  sinning  withdraws  from  the  order  of 
reason,  and  thereby  falls  from  human  dignity,  so  far 
as  that  consists  in  man  being  naturally  free  and 
existent  for  his  own  sake  [autocentric]  ;  and  falls  in 
a  manner  into  the  state  of  servitude  proper  to  beasts, 
according  to  that  of  the  Psalm  (xlviii.  15) :  Man  when 
he  was  in  honour  did  not  understand :  he  hath  matched 
himself  with  senseless  beasts  and  become  like  unto  them ; 
and  Proverbs  xi.  20  :  The  fool  ^hall  serve  the  wise.  And 


350 


OF  THE  STATE. 


therefore,  though  to  kill  a  man,  while  he  abides  in 
his  native  dignity,  be  a  thing  of  itself  evil,  yet  to  kill 
a  man  who  is  a  sinner  may  be  good,  as  to  kill  a 
beast.  For  worse  is  an  evil  man  than  a  beast,  and 
more  noxious,  as  the  Philosopher  says."  (2a  235, 
q.  64,  art.  2,  ad  3.) 

Hence  observe : — (i)  That  a  Utilitarian  who 
denies  free  will,  as  many  of  that  school  do,  stands  at 
some  loss  whence  to  show  cause  why  even  an  inno- 
cent man  may  not  be  done  to  death  for  reasons  of 
State,  e.g.,  as  a  sanitary  precaution. 

(2)  That  the  State  must  come  to  a  conclusion 
about  inward  dispositions  by  presumption  from  overt 
acts,  arguing  serious  moral  guilt  before  proceeding 
to  capital  punishment.  To  this  extent  the  State  is 
remotely  a  judge  of  sin.  But  it  does  not  punish  sin 
retrihutively  as  sin,  nor  even  medicinally .  It  punishes 
the  violation  of  its  own  laws,  to  deter  future  offenders. 
{Ethics,  c.  ix.,  s.  iii.,  nn.  4 — 6,  pp.  171 — 174.) 

Readings. — St.Thos.,  2a  2ce,  q.  64,  art.  2,  3  ;  2a  235, 

q.  108,  art.  3. 

Section  IX. — Of  War. 

I.  War,  a  science  by  itself,  has  no  interest  for 
the  philosopher  except  as  an  instance  on  a  grand 
scale  of  self-defence.  When  the  theory  of  self-defence 
has  been  mastered  (c.  ii.  s.  ii.,  p.  208),  little  further 
remains  to  be  said  about  war.  In  a  State,  the  self- 
defence  of  citizen  against  citizen  is  confined  to  the 
moment  of  immediate  physical  aggression.  But  in 
a  region  where  the  State  is  powerless  and  practically 
non-existent,  self-defence  assumes  a  far  greater  ampli- 
tude, (s.  ii.,  n.  2,  p.  309.)     When  the  Highland  chief 


WAR  351 

lifted  the  cattle  of  the  Lowland  farmer,  and  the 
King  of  Scotland  lay  unconcerned  and  unable  to 
intervene,  feasting  at  Holyrood,  or  fighting  on  the 
English  border,  then,  if  there  were  a  fair  hope  of 
recovering  the  booty  without  a  disproportionate 
effusion  of  blood,  the  farmer  did  right  to  arm  his 
people,  march  after  the  robber,  and  fight  him  for 
the  stolen  oxen,  as  the  gallant  Baron  of  Bradwardine 
would  fain  have  done.  {Waverley,  c.  xv.)  Here  is 
the  right  of  self-defence  in  its  full  development, 
including  the  right  of  private  war.  But  in  a  private 
individual  this  is  an  undesirable,  rank,  and  luxu- 
riant growth  ;  and  when  the  individual  comes  to 
live,  as  it  should  be  his  aim  to  live,  in  a  well- 
organized  State,  the  growth  is  pruned  and  cut 
down  :  he  may  then  defend  himself  for  the  instant 
when  the  State  cannot  defend  him ;  but  after  the 
wrong  is  done,  he  must  hold  his  hand,  and  quietly 
apply  to  the  State  to  procure  him  restitution  and 
redress.  But  there  is  no  State  of  States,  no  King 
of  Kings,  upon  earth ;  therefore,  when  of  two  inde- 
pendent States  the  one  has  wronged,  or  is  about  to 
wrong  the  other,  and  will  not  desist  nor  make 
amends,  nothing  is  left  for  it ;  Nature  has  made  no 
other  provision,  but  they  must  fight.  They  must 
fall  back  upon  the  steel  and  the  shotted  gun,  the 
raiio  ultima  regum. 

2.  The  Lowland  farmer  above  mentioned  might 
be  spoken  of  as  punishing  the  Highland  robber, 
chastising  his  insolence,  and  the  like.  This  is  popular 
phraseology,  but  it  is  not  accurate.  Punishment, 
an  act  of  vindictive  justice,  is   from  superior   to  in- 


352  OF   THE   STATE. 

ferior.  {Ethics,  c.  v.,  s.  ix.,  n.  4,  p.  104.)  War,  like  other 
self-defence,  is  between  equals.  War  is  indeed  an 
act  of  authority,  of  the  authority  of  each  belligerent 
State  over  its  own  subjects,  but  not  of  one  belligerent 
over  the  other.  We  are  not  here  considering  the 
case  of  putting  down  a  rebellion :  rebels  are  not 
properly  belligerents,  and  have  no  belligerent  rights. 

3.  The  study  of  Civil  and  Canon  Law  flourished 
in  the  Middle  Ages,  while  moral  science,  which  is 
the  study  of  the  Natural  Law,  was  still  in  its  in- 
fancy. No  wonder  that  the  mediaeval  jurists  occa- 
sionally formulated  maxims,  which  can  only  be 
squared  with  the  principles  of  Natural  Law  by  an 
exceeding  amount  of  interpretation, — which  are  in 
fact  much  better  dropped,  quoted  though  they  some- 
times be  by  moralists  of  repute.  One  such  maxim 
is  this,  that  a  wrong-doer  becomes  the  subject  of  the 
injured  party  by  reason  of  the  offence.  Admit  this,  and 
you  can  hardly  keep  clear  of  Locke's  doctrine  of  the 
origin  of  civil  power,  (s.  ii.,  per  toium,  p.  307;  of. 
Suarez,  De  Caritate,  d.  xiii.,  s.  iv.,  nn.  5,  6.) 

4.  We  have  only  to  repeat  about  war  what  we 
said  of  self-defence,  that  all  the  killing  that  takes 
place  in  it  is  incidental,  or  indirect.  The  cannon  that 
you  see  in  Woolwich  Arsenal,  the  powder  and  tor- 
pedoes, have  for  their  end  what  St.  Thomas  {De 
Potentia,  q.  7,  art.  2,  ad  10)  declares  to  be  the  end 
and  object  of  the  soldier,  "  to  upset  the  foe,"  to  put 
him  hors  de  combat.  This  is  accomplished  in  such 
rough  and  ready  fashion,  as  the  business  admits  of; 
by  means  attended  with  incidental  results  of  ex- 
tremest   horror.      But   no  sooner  has  the    bayonet 


^AR.  353 

thrust  or  the  bullet  laid  the  soldier  low,  and  con- 
verted him  into  a  non-combatant,  than  the  ambu- 
lance men  are  forward  to  see  that  he  shall  not  die. 
If  indeed  even  in  the  dust  he  continues  to  be  aggres- 
sive, like  the  wounded  Arabs  at  Tel-el-Kebir,  he 
must  be  quieted  and  repressed  a  second  time. 
Probably  he  will  not  escape  with  life  from  a  second 
repression:  still,  speaking  with  philosophic  precision, 
we  must  say  that  "  to  quiet,  not  to  kill  him,"  is,  or 
should  be,  the  precise  and  formal  object  of  the  will 
of  his  slayer  in  war.  St.  Thomas  indeed  (2a  2ae, 
q.  64,  art.  7,  in  corp.)  seems  to  allow  the  soldier 
fighting  against  the  .enemy  to  mean  to  kill  his  man, 
But  by  enemy  in  this  passage  we  should  probably 
understand  rebel.  The  soldier  spoken  of  is  the  in- 
strument of  the  feudal  lord  bringing  back  to  duty 
his  rebellious  vassal.  In  the  Middle  Ages,  till  the 
end  of  the  fifteenth  century,  the  notion  of  inde- 
pendent nations  scarcely  found  place. 

In  war,  as  all  cases  of  self-defence,  the  killing 
is  indirect.  In  capital  punishment,  on  the  other 
hand,  the  killing  is  direct :  it  being  chosen  as  a  deter- 
rent means,  that  the  offender  be  "hanged  by  the 
neck"  till  he  is  "dead,  dead,  dead."  This  disposes 
of  the  error,  that  capital  punishment  is  an  act  of 
self-defence  on  the  part  of  the  State  against  evil- 
doers. We  may  observe  finally  that  by  the  right 
of  the  sword,  and  by  that  alone,  not  in  self-defence, 
not  in  war,  but  by  the  hand  of  public  justice  raised 
against  a  guilty  subject,  can  human  Hfe  ever  be 
taken  directly, 

Reading. — St.  Thos.,  2a  2ae,  q.  40,  art.  I. 
X 


354 


OF  THE  STATE. 


Section  X. — Of  the  Scope  and  Aim  of  Civil  Government. 

I.  I  beseech  the  pious  reader  not  to  be  shocked 
and  scandalised  by  the  conclusions  of  this  section. 
He  will  find  them  in  the  end  a  valuable  support  to 
theology.  The  most  religious  mind  can  have  no 
difficulty  in  allowing  that  cookery,  as  such,  is  a 
business  of  this  world  only :  that  you  retam  your 
cook,  not  to  save  your  soul,  but  to  prepare  palatable 
and  wholesome  nourishment  for  3'Our  body ;  that 
honesty,  sobriety,  and  good  temper  are  officially 
requisite  qualifications,  simply  inasmuch  as  the 
contrary  vices  would  be  the  plague  of  your  kitchen 
and  the  spoiling  of  your  dinner.  In  a  Catholic 
house  the  soup  on  a  Friday  is  made  without  meat. 
That  restriction  is  observed,  not  as  a  point  of 
culinary  art,  but  because,  whereas  eternal  salvation 
is  the  main  end  of  life,  and  cookery  a  subordinate 
end,  the  latter  must  be  so  prosecuted  as  not  to 
interfere  with  the  former.  She  who  uses  ingredients 
forbidden  by  the  Church,  is  the  worse  Christian, 
but  she  may  be  the  better  cook.  Now,  to  compare 
a  great  thing  with  a  little,  the  State  equally  with  the 
kitchen  is  a  creation  of  this  world, — there  are  no 
nationalities,  nor  kitchen-ranges  either,  beyond  the 
grave.  Civil  government  is  a  secular  concern.  The 
scope  and  aim  intrinsic  to  it,  and  attainable  by  its 
own  proper  forces,  is  a  certain  temporal  good. 
Suarez  [De  Legihus,  III.,  xi.,  7)  sets  forth  that  good 
to  be, — "  the  natural  happiness  of  the  perfect  human 
community,  whereof  the  civil  legislature  has  the 
care,  and   the   happiness   of  individuals  as  they  are 


SCOPE   AND   AIM   OF  CIVIL   GOVERNMENT.       355 


members  of  such  of  a  community,  that  they  may 
Uve  therein  peaceably  and  justly,  and  with  a  suffi- 
ciency of  goods  for  the  preservation  and  comfort  of 
their  bodily  life,  and  with  so  much  moral  rectitude 
as  is  necessary  for  this  external  peace  and  happiness 
of  the  commonwealth  and  the  continued  preservation 
of  human  nature." 

2.  The  intrinsic  scope  and  aim  of  civil  govern- 
ment is  the  good  of  the  citizens  as  citizens.  That, 
we  have  to  show,  is  not  any  good  of  the  world  to 
come ;  nor  again  the  full  measure  of  good  requisite 
for  individual  well-being  in  this  world.  The  good 
of  the  citizens  as  such  is  that  which  they  enjoy  in 
common  in  their  social  and  political  capacity: 
namely,  security,  wealth,  liberty,  commerce,  the  arts 
of  life,  arms,  glory,  empire,  sanitation,  and  the  like, 
all  which  goods,  of  their  own  nature,  reach  not 
beyond  this  world.  True,  a  certain  measure  of 
moral  rectitude  also  is  maintained  in  common,  but 
only  "  so  much  as  is  necessary  for  the  external 
peace  and  happiness  of  the  commonwealth,"  not 
that  rectitude  of  the  whole  man  which  is  required 
in  view  of  the  world  to  come.  {Ethics,  c.  x.,  n.  4  [3], 
p.  182.)  The  intrinsic  aim  of  the  State,  then,  falls  short 
of  the  next  life.  Neither  does  it  cover  the  entire  good 
of  the  individual  even  for  this  life.  The  good  of 
the  State,  and  of  each  citizen  as  a  citizen,  which  it 
is  the  purpose  of  civil  government  to  procure,  is  a 
mere  grand  outline,  within  which  every  man  has  to 
fill  in  for  himself  the  little  square  of  his  own  personal 
perfection  and  happiness.  Happiness,  as  we  have 
seen,  lies  essentially  in  inward  acts.     The  conditions 


356  OF   THE   STATE. 


of  these  acts,  outward  tranquillity  and  order,  are 
the  statesman's  care  :  the  acts  themselves  must  be 
elicited  by  each  individual  from  his  own  heart. 
Happiness  also  depends  greatly  on  domestic  life, 
the  details  of  which,  at  least  when  they  stop  short 
of  wife-beating,  come  not  within  the  cognisance  of 
the  civil  power.  It  remains,  as  we  have  said,  that 
the  scope  and  aim  of  the  State,  within  its  own 
sphere  and  the  compass  of  its  own  powers,  is  the 
temporal  prosperity  of  the  body  politic,  and  the 
prosperity  of  its  members  as  they  are  its  members 
and  citizens,  but  not  absolutely  as  they  are  men. 
We  cannot  repeat  too  often  the  saying  of  St. Thomas: 
**  Man  is  not  ordained  to  the  political  commonwealth 
to  the  full  extent  of  all  that  he  is  and  has."  (la  2as, 
q.  21,  art.  4,  ad  3.) 

3.  From  this  view  it  appears  that  the  end  for 
which  the  State  exists  is  indeed  an  important  and 
necessary  good,  but  it  is  not  all  in  all  to  man,  not 
his  perfect  and  final  happiness.  To  guide  man  to 
that  is  the  office  of  the  Christian  Church  in  the 
present  order  of  Providence.  Cook  and  statesman 
must  so  go  about  the  proper  ends  of  their  several 
offices,  as  not  to  stand  in  the  way  of  the  Church, 
compassing  as  she  does  that  supreme  end  to  which 
all  other  ends  are  subordinate.  This  limitation  they 
are  bound  to  observe,  not  as  cook  and  statesman, 
but  as  men  and  Christians.  A  perfectly  Christian 
State,  as  Christian,  has  a  twofold  duty.  First,  it 
has  a  positive  duty,  at  the  request  of  the  Church,  to 
follow  up  ecclesiastical  laws  with  corresponding  civil 
enactments,  e.g.,  laws  against  criminous  clerks  and 


SCOPE  AND   AIM   OF  CIVIL   GOVERNMENT.        357 

excommunicates.  On  this  spiritual  f^round,  being 
beyond  its  jurisdiction,  the  State  must  be  careful 
not  to  forestall  but  to  second  the  precept  of  spiritual 
authority.  It  is  no  business  of  the  State,  as  such, 
to  punish  a  purely  religious  offence.  The  second 
duty  of  a  Christian  State,  and  a  more  urgent  duty 
even  than  the  former,  is  the  negative  one  of  making 
no  civil  enactment  to  the  prejudice  of  the  Church : 
e.g.,  not  to  subject  clerics  to  the  law  of  conscription. 
Useful  as  their  arms  might  be  for  the  defence  of  the 
country,  the  State  must  forego  that  utility  for  the 
sake  of  a  higher  end. 

4.  In  the  order  of  pure  nature,  which  is  the  order 
of  philosophy,  there  is  of  course  no  Church.  Still 
there  would  be,  as  we  have  seen  (c.  i.,  s.  i.,  n.  8, 
p.  197),  erected  on  the  same  lines  as  the  civil  power, 
and  working  side  by  side  with  it,  a  religious  power 
competent  to  prescribe  and  conduct  divine  worship. 
This  power  the  State  would  be  bound  to  abet  and 
support,  both  positively  and  negatively;  something  in 
the  same  manner,  but  not  to  the  same  degree,  as  the 
Christian  State  is  bound  to  abet  the  Church.  The 
supreme  direction  of  the  natural  religious  power 
would  conveniently  be  vested  in  the  person  of  the 
Civil  Ruler.  Thus  the  Roman  Emperor  was  also 
Chief  Pontiff. 

5.  How  in  the  mere  natural,  as  distinguished  from 
the  Christian  order,  the  provinces  of  marriage  and 
education  should  be  divided  between  the  civil  and 
the  religious  power,  is  perhaps  not  a  very  profitable 
enquiry.  The  only  use  of  it  is  a  polemic  use  in 
arguing  with  men  of  no  Christianity.     Among  all 


358  Oh-   THE   STATE. 


men  of  any  religion,  marriage  has  ever  been  re- 
garded as  one  of  those  occasions  of  hfe  that  bring 
man  into  special  relation  with  God,  and  therefore 
into  some  dependence  on  God's  ministers.  Educa- 
tion, again,  has  a  religious  element,  to  be  super- 
intended by  the  religious  power.  Education  has  a 
secular  element  also,  the  general  superintendence  of 
which  cannot  be  denied  to  the  State.  Though 
children  are  facts  of  the  domestic  order,  and  the 
care  and  formation  of  them  belongs  primarily  to 
their  parents,  yet  if  the  parents  neglect  their  charge, 
the  State  can  claim  the  right  of  interv^ention  ababusu. 
It  certainly  is  within  the  province  of  the  State  to 
prevent  any  parent  from  launching  upon  the  world 
a  brood  of  young  barbarians,  ready  to  disturb  the 
peace  of  civil  society.  The  practical  issue  is,  who 
are  barbarians  and  what  is  understood  by  peace.  The 
Emperor  Decius  probably  considered  every  Christian 
child  an  enemy  of  the  Pax  Romana.  But  the  mis- 
application of  a  maxim  does  not  derogate  from  its 
truth.  It  also  belongs  to  the  State  to  see  that  no 
parent  behaves  like  a  Cyclops  (/cu/cXwTrt/fco?,  Ar.,  Eth.^ 
X.,  ix.,  13)  in  his  family,  ordering  his  children,  not 
to  their  good,  as  a  father  is  bound  to  do,  but  to  his 
own  tyrannical  caprice.  For  itistruction,  as  distin- 
guished from  education,  it  is  the  parent's  duty  to 
provide  his  child  with  so  much  of  it  as  is  necessary, 
in  the  state  of  society  wherein  his  lot  is  cast,  to 
enable  the  child  to  make  his  way  in  the  world  accord- 
ing to  the  condition  of  his  father.  In  many  walks  ol 
life  one  might  as  well  be  short  of  a  finger  as  not 
know  how  to  read  and  write.     Where  ignorance  is 


LAIV   AND   LlfJEUrY.  359 


such  a  disadvantage,  the  parent  is  not  allowed  to  let 
his  child  grow  up  ignorant.  There,  if  he  neglects  to 
have  him  taught,  the  State  may  step  in  with  com- 
pulsory schooling.  Conipnlsory  schooling  for  all 
indiscriminately,  and  that  up  to  a  hi,';;h  standard,  is 
quite  another  matter. 

Readings. — Suarez,  De  Lcgibns,  III.,  vi. ;  ib.,  IV., 
ii.,  nn.  3,  4:  St.  Thos.,  la  zse,  q.  93,  art.  3,  ad  3;  ib., 
q.  96,  art.  2;  ib.,  q.  98,  art.  i,  in  corp. ;  'ib.,  q.  99, 
art.  3,  in  corp. ;  ib.,  q.  100,  art.  2,  in  corp. 

Section  XI. — Of  Law  and  Liberty. 

1.  The  student  of  Natural  Law  does  not  share 
the  vulgar  prejudice  against  civil  law  and  lawyers. 
He  knows  it  for  a  precept  of  the  Natural  Law,  that 
there  should  be  a  State  set  up,  and  that  this  State 
should  proceed  to  positive  legislation.  This  legisla 
tion  partly  coincides  with  Natural  Law  in  urging  the 
practice  of  that  limited  measure  of  morality,  which 
IS  necessary  for  the  State  to  do  its  office  and  to  be 
at  all.  (s.  X.,  n.  2,  p.  355.)  This  partial  enforcement 
of  the  Law  of  Nature  is  the  main  work  of  the 
criminal  law  of  the  State.  But  State  legislation  goes 
beyond  the  Natural  Law,  and  in  the  nature  of  things 
must  go  beyond  it.  Natural  Law  leaves  a  thousand 
conflicting  rights  undetermined,  which  in  the  interest 
of  society,  to  save  quarrels,  must  be  determined 
one  way  or  another. 

2.  An  illustration.  It  is  an  axiom  of  Natural  Law, 
that  res  peril  domino ;  that  is,  the  owner  bears  the 
loss.  If  an  article  under  sale  perishes  before  delivery, 
the  loss  falls,  apart  from  contracts  to  the  contrary, 


36o  OF  THE  STATE. 

upon  whichever  of  the  two  parties  is  the  owner  at 
the  time.  So  far  nature  rules.  But  who  is  the 
owner  at  any  given  time,  and  at  what  stage  of  the 
transaction  does  the  dominion  pass  ?  That  can  only 
be  settled  by  custom  and  the  law  of  the  land.  "  If 
I  order  a  pipe  of  port  from  a  wine-merchant  abroad  ; 
at  what  period  the  property  passes  from  the  mer- 
chant to  me  ;  whether  upon  delivery  of  the  wine  ai 
the  merchant's  warehouse;  upon  its  being  put  on 
shipboard  at  Oporto ;  upon  the  arrival  of  the  ship  in 
England  at  its  destined  port ;  or  not  till  the  wine  be 
committed  to  my  servants,  or  deposited  in  my  cellar; 
all  are  questions  which  admit  of  no  decision  but  w^hat 
custom  points  out."  (Paley,  Mor.  Phil.,  bk.  iii.,  p.  i, 
c.  vii.) 

This  leads  us  to  remark  upon  the  much  admired 
sentence  of  Tacitus,  in  corrttpiissima  repuhlica  pht- 
rimcB  leges,  that  not  merely  the  multitude  of  transgres- 
sions, but  the  very  complexity  of  a  highly  developed 
civilization,  requires  to  be  kept  in  order  by  a  vast 
body  of  positive  law.  .     . 

3.  Incidentally  we  may  also  remark,  that  the  law 
of  the  State  does  not  create  the  right  of  property ; 
otherwise,  abolishing  its  own  creation,  the  State 
could  bring  in  Communism,  (c.  vii.,  s.  i.,  p.  278.) 
But  finding  this  right  of  property  unprotected  and 
undetermined,  the  State  by  its  criminal  law  protects 
property  against  robbers,  and  by  its  civil  as  dis- 
tinguished from  criminal  law,  it  defines  numerous 
open  questions  between  possessors  as  to  manner  of 
acquirement  and  conditions  of  tenure. 

4.  All  civil  laws  bind  the  conscience:  some  by 


LAW   AND   LIBERTY.  361 

way  of  a  categorical  imperative,  Do  this :  others  by 
way  of  a  disjunctive,  Do  this,  or  bcin^  caught  acting 
othemise,  submit  to  the  penalty.  The  latter  are  called 
purely  penal  laws,  an  expression,  by  the  way,  which 
has  no  reference  to  the  days  of  religious  persecution. 
Civil  law  binds  the  conscience  categorically  whenevei 
the  civil  ruler  so  intends.  In  the  absence  of  express 
declaration,  it  must  be  presumed  that  he  so  intends 
whenever  his  law  is  an  enforcement  of  the  Natural 
Law,  or  a  determination  of  the  same ;  as  when  the 
observance  is  necessary  to  the  preservation  of  the 
State,  or  when  the  ruler  determines  what  lapse  of 
time  shall  be  necessary  for  the  acquisition  of  property 
by  prescription.  Very  frequently,  the  parties  to  a 
contract  tacitly  accept  the  dispositions  of  the  civil 
law  as  forming  part  of  their  agreement ;  and  in  this 
indirect  fashion  the  civil  law  becomes  binding  on  the 
conscience.  In  this  way  an  Englishman  who  accepts 
a  bill  of  exchange  tacitly  binds  himself  to  pay  interest 
at  five  per  cent.,  if  the  bill  is  not  met  at  maturity,  for 
such  is  the  disposition  of  the  English  Law.  It  may 
be  further  observed  that  no  prudent  legislator  would 
attach  a  severe  penalty  to  what  was  not  already 
wrong. 

5.  In  Roman  times  it  was  part  of  the  flattery  of 
the  imperial  jurists  to  their  master,  to  tell  him  that 
he  was  above  the  laws,  Icgibus  solutus.  In  the  trial 
of  Louis  XVI.,  the  Sovereign  People,  or  they  who 
called  themselves  such,  dispensed  with  certain  legal 
formalities  on  that  same  plea.  Against  the  law  at 
Athens,  the  generals  who  had  fought  at  Arginusae 
were   condemned   by   one   collective    sentence,   the 


362  OP  THE  SIATe. 


anger  of  the  Sovereign  People  being  too  impatient 
to  vote  on  them  separately,  as  the  law  required. 
Hereupon  we  must  observe  in  the  first  place,  that 
the  Supreme  Ruler,  whether  one  man  or  a  multitude, 
can  never  be  brought  to  trial  in  his  own  court  for 
any  legal  offence.  As  all  justice  requires  two  terms  : 
no  power  can  do  justice  on  itself.  {Ethics,  c.  v.,  s.  ix., 
n.  I,  p.  102.)  This  truth  is  embodied  in  the  English 
maxim,  that  the  king  can  do  no  wrong.  Again,  the 
Sovereign  is  either  expressly  or  virtually  exempted 
from  the  compass  of  many  laws,  e.g.  those  which 
concern  the  flying  of  certain  flags  or  ensigns,  and 
other  petty  matters.  Thirdly,  we  have  the  principle, 
that  no  being  can  give  a  law  to  himself.  {Ethics,  c.  vi. 
s.  ii.,  n.  3,  p.  117.)  Lastly,  we  must  observe  that  there 
is  no  law  so  fundamental  but  what  the  Supreme 
Power,  taken  in  its  entirety,  can  alter  it,  and  by  con- 
sequence dispense  from  it.  From  these  considera- 
tions it  follows  that  the  Sovereign — the  complete  and 
absolute  Sovereign,  be  he  one  man  or  many — lies 
under  no  legal  obligation  to  obey  any  law  of  his  own 
making  as  such.  It  does  not  follow  that  he  is  perfectly 
free  to  ignore  the  laws.  He  is  bound  in  conscience 
and  before  God  to  make  his  government  effectual ;  and 
effectual  it  cannot  be,  if  the  laws  are  despised ;  and 
despised  they  will  be,  if  the  Sovereign  gives  scandal 
by  ignoring  them  in  his  own  practice.  Therefore 
the  Sovereign,  be  he  King,  Council,  or  Assembly,  is 
bound  in  conscience  and  before  God,  though  not 
legally  of  his  own  jurisdiction,  so  far  himself  to  stand 
to  the  observance  of  the  law  as  not  to  render  it 
nugatory  in  the  eyes  and  practice  of  others. 


LAW  AND   LIBERTY.  963 

6.  Law  and  liberty  are  like  the  strings  and 
meshes  of  a  net.  In  the  one  limit  of  minimum  of 
mesh,  the  net  passes  into  sack-cloth,  where  nothing 
could  get  through.  In  the  other  limit  of  maximum 
of  mesh,  the  net  vanishes,  and  everything  would  get 
through.  We  cannot  praise  in  the  abstract  either  a 
large  mesh  or  a  small  one :  the  right  size  is  according 
to  the  purpose  for  which  the  net  is  to  be  used  in  each 
particular  case.  So  neither  can  law  nor  liberty  be 
praised,  as  Burke  says,  **  on  a  simple  view  of  the 
subject,  as  it  stands  stripped  of  every  relation,  in  all 
the  nakedness  and  solitude  of  metaphysical  abstrac- 
tion." We  can  only  praise  either  as  it  is  "clothed 
in  circumstances."  Commonly  we  are  led  to  praise 
the  one  by  getting  too  much  of  the  other.  Con- 
founded in  a  tangle  of  fussy,  vexatious,  perhaps 
malicious  restrictions,  men  cry  loudly  for  liberty. 
When  people  all  about  us  are  doing  things  by  their 
own  sweet  will,  we  are  converted  to  praise  of  regu- 
lation and  discipline  and  the  wholesome  restraint  of 
law. 

Readings. — St.  Thos.,  la  2ae,  q.  96,  art.  5,  ad  3 ; 
Suarez,  De  Legibus,  III.,  xxxv. ;  tb.,  V.,  iv. ;  Ruskin, 
Seven  Lamps  of  Architecture,  c.  vii.,  §§  i,  2. 


364  OF   THE   STATE. 


Section  XII. — Of  Liberty  of  Opinion. 

1.  We  are  here  dealing  with  Hberty  only  so  far 
as  it  means  exemption  from  State  control.  So  far  as 
the  State  is  concerned,  a  man  has  the  fullest  liberty 
to  hold  in  his  heart  the  most  seditious  opinions, 
and  to  think  the  foulest  thoughts,  so  long  as  they 
do  not  appear  in  his  public  language  and  conduct. 
The  heart  is  free  from  all  mere  humanlaw,  resting 
in  subjection  to  His  law  alone,  and  in  responsibility 
to  His  judgment,  who  is  the  Searcher  of  Hearts. 

2.  We  are  dealing  then  not  properly  with 
opinion,  but  with  the  public  expression  of  opinion. 
We  are  dealing  with  that  expression  as  controllable 
by  the  State,  not  acting  in  deference  to  the  invitation 
of  any  religious  power,  but  of  its  own  initiative  and 
proper  authority,  in  view  of  its  own  end,  scope  and 
aim,  which  is  social  order  and  public  prosperity  for 
this  life.  (s.  x.,  nn.  2,  3,  p.  355.) 

3.  That  there  are  doctrines  dangerous  to  social 
order,  cannot  be  denied,  unless  we  are  to  cease  to 
believe  in  any  influence  of  thought  upon  conduct. 
It  is  important  to  the  State,  that  men  should  have 
the  greatest  possible  horror  of  crime,  (s.  viii.,  nn.  3,  6, 
PP'  345>  348-)  This  horror  is  notably  impaired 
when  all  idea  of  sin  is  taken  away.  Now  the  idea 
of  sin  vanishes  with  that  of  God.  {Ethics,  c,  vi., 
s.  ii.,  nn.  6,  7,  13,  pp.  iig,  123.)  Therefore  to  pull 
down  the  idea  of  God  among  a  nation  of  theists, 
whether  by  the  wiles  of  a  courtly  Professor  at  a 
University,  or  by  the  tub-thumping  blasphemy  of 
an  itinerant  lecturer,  is  to  injure  the  State.     The 


LIBERTY   OF  OPINION.  365 


tub-thumper  however  is  the  more  easily  reached  by 
the  civil  authority,  especially  when  his  discourses 
raise  a  tumult  among  the  people.  But  where  attacks 
upon  theism  have  become  common,  and  unbelief  is 
already  rampant  among  the  masses,  for  the  State  to 
interfere  with  either  "  leader  of  thought,"  high  or 
low,  would  be  a  shutting  of  the  stable-door  after  the 
steed  was  stolen.  Similarly  we  should  speak  of 
those  who  subvert  the  received  notions  touching  the 
sanctity  of  the  marriage-tie  and  the  law  of  external 
purity  generally,  the  obligation  of  civil  allegiance,  the 
rights  of  property  and  of  life. 

4.  It  will  be  objected :  **  The  doctrines  that  you 
wish  to  express  as  inimical  to  the  peace  of  the 
commonwealth,  possibly  may  be  true.  Did  not  the 
first  heralds  of  Christianity  trouble  the  peace  of  the 
Roman  world  ?  "  We  reply  :  Let  the  new  teachers 
come  to  us  as  those  apostolic  men  came,  "  in  weak- 
ness and  in  fear  and  in  much  trembling,"  and  yet 
withal  "  in  the  showing  of  the  spirit  and  power," 
with  an  "  exhortation  not  of  uncleanness,"  nor  upon 
"an  occasion  of  covetousness,"  "  holily  and  justly 
and  without  blame  "  (i  Cor.  ii.  3,  4 ;  i  Thess.  ii.  3, 
5,  10)  ;  and  we  will  receive  them  as  angels  of  God, 
even  to  the  plucking  out  of  our  own  eyes,  if  need  be, 
and  giving  to  them.  (Gal.  iv.  15.)  Any  hostile  recep- 
tion that  they  may  meet  with  at  first  from  a  mis- 
application of  our  principle,  will  soon  be  made  up 
for  by  welcome  and  veneration.  There  is  no  principle 
that  may  not  be  momentarily  misapplied  in  all  good 
faith.  But  the  mistake  in  this  case  will  readily  be 
rectified. 


3^6  OF   THE   STATE. 


5.  But,   writes  J.  S.  Mill,  Oji  Liberty,  "we  can 
never  be  sure  that  the  opinion  we  are  endeavouring 
to  stifle  is  a  false  opinion."     If  we  cannot,  then  is 
there  no  such  thing  as  certainty  upon  any  point  of 
morals,  politics,  or  religion.   Assassination  of  tyrants, 
whether  in  public  or  private  life,  may  be  wickedness, 
or  it  may  be  a  laudable  outburst  of  public  spirit,  who 
knows  ?    Which  of  us  is  sure  that  all  property  is  not 
theft?     Plato's  views  on   marriage  and   infanticide 
may   be   correct  :    the    Nihilist    may    be   your   true 
politician  ;  and  all  our  religious  knowledge  dwindles 
down  to  the  confession  of  Protagoras  :  "  Concerning 
Gods,  I  find  no  clear  evidence  whether  they  are  or 
are  not,  or  what  manner  of  beings  they  are."  These 
are  the  sceptical  tremors  which  this  denial  induces. 
But    even     scepticism    has    its    proof,   which     Mill 
furnishes  as  follows  :  "  All  silencing  of  discussion  is 
an  assumption  of  infallibility."     The  very  name  in- 
fallibility has  an  effect  upon  the  modern  Englishman 
like  that  of  Popery  upon  his  forefathers.     It  shakes 
his  nerves,   obscures  his  judgment,  and  scares  his 
seated  reason  to  leap  up  from  her  throne.    But  after 
we  have  recovered  from  our  fright,  we  recollect  that, 
whereas  infallibility  is  an  all-round  attribute,  ccm- 
passing  an  entire  subject,  certainty  goes  out  to  one 
particular  point  on  the  circumference ;  we  may  then 
be  certain  without  being  infallible.  Extremely  fallible 
as  I  am  in  geography,  I  am  nevertheless  certain  that 
Tunis  is  in  Africa.  Silencing  discussion  is  an  assump- 
tion, not  of  infallibility,  but  of  certainty.     The  man 
who  never  dares  assume  that  he  is  certain  of  any- 
thing, so  certain  as  to  close  his  ears  to  all  further 


LIBERTY   OF  OPINION.  367 


discussion,   comes    nothing    short    of    a    universal 
sceptic. 

6.  We  are  told,  free  discussion  promotes  dis- 
covery. Yes,  free  discussion  in  philosophical  circles, 
free  discussion  among  competent  persons.  But  free 
discussion  of  a  subject  among  the  incompetent  and 
the  incapable,  and  the  passionate  and  the  prejudiced, 
is  not  good  for  the  cause  of  truth;  and  if  the  subject 
be  practical  and  momentous,  it  is  not  good  for  the 
disputants  either,  nor  for  the  community.  If  we 
allow  that  the  science  and  practice  of  morality  is 
not  advanced  by  free  debate  of  ethical  questions  in 
nurseries  and  boarding-schools,  we  must  also  bear 
in  mind  that  a  vast  proportion  of  the  human  family 
remain  all  their  lives  long,  for  the  purpose  of  such 
discussions,  as  incompetent  as  children.  The  multi- 
tude cannot  be  philosophers.  They  have  neither 
time,  nor  intelligence,  nor  love  of  hard  thinking 
sufficient  to  arrive  at  the  final  and  adequate  why 
and  wherefore  of  their  every  duty.  Though  capable 
of  doing  right,  they  are  quite  incapable  of  doing  so 
philosophically.  They  do  it  according  as  they  are 
led  by  custom  and  authority.  Their  inheritance  is 
the  traditionary  wisdom  of  mankind,  which  they  live 
upon  as  an  infant  on  his  estate,  not  understanding 
whence  their  support  comes.  It  is  dangerous  to 
batter  them  with  objections  against  the  received 
moral  law.  You  will  overthrow  them,  not  confirm 
them  by  the  result  of  your  reasonings :  you  will 
perplex  their  intellect,  you  will  confound  their  good 
purpose,  you  will  awaken  their  evil  passions.  Surely 
it  is  a  more  necessary  point  to  secure  that  right  be 


368  OF   THE   STATE. 


done  somehow,  than  that  it  be  philosophically  done. 
The  one  is  difficult  enough,  the  other  quite  impossible 
for  the  mass  of  mankind.  Therefore,  adapting  to 
our  purpose  the  old  Greek  oracle  :  "let  us  not  disturb 
the  foundations  of  popular  morality  :  they  are  better 
undisturbed  " — 

M);  kIvh  Kafidpivay  clkIvtitos  yhp  ifielywv. 

7.  But  is  it  not  immoral  to  interfere  with  con- 
science, and  to  attempt  to  stifle  sincere  convictions  ? 
The  State,  we  repeat,  has  nothing  to  do  with  con- 
science as  such,  nor  with  the  inward  convictions  of 
any  man.  But  if  the  State  is  sincerely  convinced, 
that  the  convictions  openly  professed  and  propagated 
by  some  of  its  subjects  are  subversive  of  social  order 
and  public  morality,  whose  sincere  conviction  is  it 
that  must  carry  the  day  in  practice  ?  It  is  of  the 
essence  of  government  that  the  convictions,  sincere 
or  otherwise,  of  the  governed  shall  on  certain 
practical  issues  be  waived  in  the  external  observance 
in  favour  of  the  convictions  of  the  ruhng  power. 
After  all,  this  talk  of  conscience  and  sincere  convic- 
tions is  but  the  canting  phrase  of  the  day,  according 
to  which  conscience  means  mere  wild  humour  and 
headstrong  self-will.  Such  teachings  as  those  which 
we  would  have  the  State  to  suppress,  e.g.:  An  oath 
is  a  folly  :  There  is  no  law  of  purity  :  There  is  no  harm 
in  doing  anything  that  does  not  annoy  your  neighbour : 
are  not  the  teachings  of  men  sincerely  convinced : 
they  deserve  no  respect,  consideration,  or  tenderness 
on  that  score.  We  do  not  say,  that  the  teachers  of 
these  monstrosities  are  not  convinced,  but  that  they 


LlDE'iTY  OF  OriNlON.  3G9 

arc  not  honestly  and  conscientiously  convinced  :  they 
have  blinded  themselves,  and  become  the  guilty 
authors  of  their  own  delusion.  Not  all  strong  con- 
victions are  honestly  come  by  or  virtuously  enter- 
tained. 

8.  Arraigned  for  their  utterances,  men  protest 
their  sincerity,  as  parties  indicted  for  murder  do 
their  innocence.  We  can  set  but  small  store  by 
such  protestations.  It  is  a  question  of  evidence  to 
come  from  other  sources  than  from  the  accused 
person's  own  mouth.  A  man  indeed  must  be  held 
to  be  sincere  until  he  is  proved  to  be  the  contrary. 
That  is  the  general  rule.  But  there  are  what  Roman 
lawyers  caW  prcesuiiiptiones  juris ;  circumstances  which, 
if  proved,  will  induce  the  court  to  take  a  certain  view 
of  a  case,  and  give  judgment  accordingly,  unless  by 
further  evidence  that  view  is  proved  to  be  a  false  one. 
Now  when  a  man  proclaims  some  blatant  and 
atrocious  error  in  a  matter  bearing  directly  upon 
public  morals — and  it  is  for  the  restraint  of  these 
errors  alone  that  we  are  arguing — there  is  a  decided 
prcBstwiptio  juris,  that  the  error  in  him,  however 
doggedly  he  maintains  it,  is  not  a  sincere,  candid, 
and  innocently  formed  conviction.  The  light  of 
nature  is  not  so  feeble  as  that,  among  civilized  men. 
Let  the  offender  be  admonished  and  given  time  to 
think :  but  if,  for  all  warning  to  the  contrary,  the 
wilful  man  will  have  his  way,  and  still  propagate  his 
error  to  the  confusion  of  society,  he  must  be  treated 
like  any  other  virtuous  and  well-meaning  criminal : 
he  must  be  restrained  and  coerced  to  the  extent  tliat 
the  interests  of  society  require. 

V 


570  OF  THE  STATE. 


g.  At  the  same  time  it  must  be  confessed  that 
when  an  error,  however  flagrant  and  pestilential,  has 
ceased  to  shock  and  scandaHze  the  general  body 
of  the  commonwealth :  when  the  people  listen  to 
the  doctrine  without  indignation,  and  their  worst 
sentence  upon  it  pronounces  it  merely  "queer," 
there  is  little  hope  of  legal  restraints  there  enduring 
long  or  effecting  much.  Penalties  for  the  expression 
of  opinion  are  available  only  so  far  as  they  tally  with 
the  common  feeling  of  the  country.  When  public 
opinion  ceases  to  bear  them  out,  it  is  better  not  to 
enforce  them  :  for  that  were  but  to  provoke  resent- 
ment and  make  martyrs.  No  regulations  can  be 
maintained  except  in  a  congenial  atmosphere. 
Allowance  too  must  be  made  for  the  danger  of 
driving  the  evil  to  burrow  underground. 

10.  The  censorship  of  opinions  even  in  a  model 
State  would  vary  in  method  according  to  men  and 
times.  The  censorship  of  the  Press  in  particular 
might  be  either  by  Imprimatur  required  before  print- 
ing, or  by  liability  to  prosecution  after.  The  Im- 
primatur might  be  either  for  all  books,  or  only  for  a 
certain  class.  It  might  be  either  obligatory,  or 
merely  matter  of  counsel,  to  obtain  it.  We  are  not 
to  adopt  promiscuously  all  the  praiseworthy  institu- 
tions of  our  forefathers. 

Readings. — Cardinal  Newman,  Letter  to  Duke  oj 
Norfolk,  §  5 ;  The  Month  for  June,  1883,  pp.  200, 
seqq. 


APPENDIX. 


Of  the  precepts  of  Natural  Law.  some  are  more 
simple  and  of  wider  extension;  others  are  derivative, 
complex,  and  extend  to  fewer  cases.  It  is  a  question 
of  more  and  less,  and  no  hard  and  fast  line  of 
demarcation  can  be  drawn  between  them.  The 
former  however  are  called  primary,  the  latter 
secondary  precepts.  Again,  the  nature  of  man  is 
the  same  in  all  men  and  at  all  periods  of  history 
for  its  essential  elements,  but  admits  of  wide  acci- 
dental variation  and  declension  for  the  worse. 
Thirdly,  it  is  clear  that  Natural  Law  is  a  law  good 
and  suitable  for  human  nature  to  observe.  Starting 
from  these  three  axioms,  we  apply  the  reasoning  of 
St.  Thomas,  la  2ce,  q.  96,  art.  2,  not  to  human  law 
alone,  of  which  he  is  speaking,  but  to  sundry 
secondary  precepts  of  Natural  Law.  These  are  his 
words : 

"  A  law  is  laid  down  as  a  rule  or  measure  of 
human  acts.  Now  a  measure  ought  to  be  homo- 
geneous with  the  thing  measured.  Hence  laws 
also  must  be  imposed  upon  men  according  to  their 
condition.  As  Isidore  says :  '  A  law  ought  to  be 
possible  both  according  to  nature  and  according  to 
the  custom  of  the   country.*      Now    the   power  or 


572  APPENDIX. 


faculty  of  action  proceeds  from  interior  habit  or 
disposition.  The  same  thing  is  not  possible  to  him 
who  has  no  habit  of  virtue,  that  is  possible  to  a 
virtuous  man;  as  the  same  thing  is  not  possible  to 
a  boy  and  to  a  grown  man,  and  therefore  the  same 
rule  is  not  laid  down  for  children  as  for  adults. 
Many  things  are  allowed  to  children,  that  in  adults 
are  visited  with  legal  punishment  or  with  blame, 
and  in  like  manner  many  things  must  be  allowed 
to  men  not  perfect  in  virtue,  which  would  be 
intolerable  in  virtuous  men." 

This  reasoning  leads  us  up  to  a  conclusion, 
which  St.  Thomas  states  thus  (la  2as,  q.  94.  art.  5) : 

"  A  conceivable  way  in  which  the  Natural  Law 
might  be  changed  is  the  way  of  subtraction,  that 
something  should  cease  to  be  of  the  Natural  Law 
that  was  of  it  before.  Understanding  change  in  this 
sense,  the  Natural  Law  is  absolutely  immutable  in 
its  first  principles  ;  but  as  to  secondary  precepts, 
which  are  certain  detailed  conclusions  closely  re- 
lated to  the  first  principles,  the  Natural  Law  is  not 
so  changed  as  that  its  dictate  is  not  right  in  most 
cases  steadily  to  abide  by ;  it  may  however  be 
changed  in  some  particular  case,  and  in  rare 
instances,  through  some  special  causes  impeding 
the  observance  of  these  secondary  precepts." 

The  reason  for  this  conclusion,  more  pregnant, 
it  may  be,  than  St.  Thomas  himself  discerned,  is 
given  briefly  as  follows  (2a  2ae,  q.  57,  art.  2,  ad  i)  : 

"Human  nature  is  changeable;  and  therefore 
what  is  natural  to  man  may  sometimes  fail  tc  hold 
pood." 


APPENDIX.  373 


The  precepts  of  Natural  Law  that  fail  to  be 
applicable  when  human  nature  sinks  below  par, 
are  only  secondary  precepts,  and  few  even  of  them. 
Christianity  brings  human  nature  up  to  par,  and 
fulfils  the  Natural  Law  (St.  Matt.  v.  17),  enjoining 
the  observance  of  it  in  its  integrity.  This  is  the 
meaning  of  St.  John  Chrysostom's  saying  :  "  Of 
old  not  such  an  ample  measure  of  virtue  was  pro- 
posed to  us  ;  .  .  .  but  since  the  coming  of  Christ 
the  way  has  been  made  much  narrower."  {De  Vir- 
ginitate,  c.  44  :  cf.  his  17th  Homily  on  St.  Matt.  v.  ^y  ; 
indeed  the  doctrine  is  familiar  in  his  pages.)  Thus 
the  prohibition  of  polygamy,  being  a  secondary 
precept  of  the  natural  law,  failed  in  its  application 
in  that  age  of  lapsed  humanity,  when  a  woman  was 
better  one  of  many  wives,  protected  by  one  husband, 
than  exposed  to  promiscuous  violence  and  lust. 
(Isaias  iv.  i.) 


NOTE    ON    ROUSSEAU. 

The  ruler  is  the  servant  of  the  good  of  the  people, 
not  of  the  will  of  the  people,  except  inasmuch  as — 

a.  the  ic'ill  of  the  people  is  an  indication  of 
their  ^00^,  of  which  they  are  probable  judges; 

/S.  it  is  usually  impossible  to  do  good  to  the 
people  against  their  steady  will. 


V* 


INDEX 


Aggregation  theory  of  civil 
power,  212,  307 — 8. 

Altruism,  181 — 2. 

Altum  dominium,  293, 

Anger,  61  — 4;  differs  from  hat- 
red, 63. 

Appetite  in  the  modern  sense, 
49 ;  in  the  scholastic  sense, 
85 — 6;  appetite  and  desire, 
50-    I. 

Archetype  Ideas,  114. 

Aristotle,  imperfect  as  a  moral 
philosopher,  pref.  vi — ix  ;  on 
happiness,  g,  10,  291  ;  on  the 
passions,  43  ;  on  the  mean  of 
virtue,  79;  on  death,  94;  his 
Magnanimous  Man,  98 — 101  ; 
distinguishes  chastisement 
from  vengeance,  171  ;  virtue 
from  art,  1S4;  on  property, 
279  ;  defines  a  State,  a  citizen, 
a  polity,  310,  312  ;  on  the 
State's  need  to  punish,  343 — 4. 

Atheism,  effects  of  social  and 
political,  364 — 7. 

Autocentric  and  heterocentric, 
204—5,  248,  349- 

Bain,   Alexander,   on   content, 

15;  on  punishability,  118, 
Beatific  vision,  24. 

Capital  Punishment,  30S,  346' 
— 9;  not  inconsistent  with: 
God's  dominion  over  life,  nor 
with  the  personality  (auto-j 
centric)  of  man,  349;  power  j 
of  (right  of  the  sword),  the! 
distinguishing  mark  of  sover- j 
eignty,  308,  347;  sole  instance  1 
of  rightful  direct  killing,  353,] 
cf.  349,  350.  I 

Charity,  237 — 244  ;   to  enemies, 


240 — 3  ;  obligation  of,  how 
differing  from  justice,  243 — 4. 

Church  and  State,  elementary 
philosophy  of,  354 — 7. 

Circumstances  of  act,  33 — 5  ; 
distinguished  from  means,  34, 
205—7. 

Civil  authority,  of  God,  316 — 8, 
325  ;  binds  the  conscience, 
360 — I  ;  latent  or  free,  324  ; 
various  distributions  of,  319 — 
321  ;  not  tied  to  any  one  pol- 
ity, 325 — 334;  when  rightfully 
resisted,  340 — 2. 

Comfort,  no  specific  against 
crime,  52 — 3. 

Communism,  278 — 283. 

Conscience,  natural  law  of,  133 
— 5;  defined,  135 — 6;  erron- 
eous conscience,  136 — 7  ;  re- 
quires educating,  142 — 6  ;  Con- 
science and  the  State,  368 — 9. 

Contemplation,  essence  of  happi- 
ness, 22 — 5. 

Contracts,  253 — 4. 

Delight,  or  pleasure,  quality 
of,  54  8 ;  iSo — i;  said  to 
perfect  activity,  5O  ;  not  hap- 
piness, 61,  181. 

Democracy,  may  be  tyrannical, 
321 — 2  ;  not  tiie  sole  valid  po- 
lity, sheer  democracy  difficult 
to  work,  329 — 334  ;  original 
and  residual  polity.  335 — 6; 
no  special  sanctity  attaching 
to  democracy,  342. 

Deontology,  pref  viii.  i,  2,  109 
sq. 

Desire,  physical  and  psychical, 

49—53 
Direct    and    indirect    (or    inci- 


376 


INDEX. 


dental)  definerl,  203 — 5,  cf.  31 
sq. 

Divorce,  274 — 7. 

Duelling,  essential  wrong  of, 
222 — 4. 

Dumb  animals,  our  relations 
with,  248 — 251. 

Duty,  matter  not  of  mere  good- 
ness, but  of  law,  115  sq.;  duties 
of  justice,  correlative  of  a 
right,  246 — 7  ;  duties  negative 
and  positive,  247. 

Education,  the  State's  part  in, 

358-9- 

End  in  view,  3 — 5,  31 — 9;  end 
does  not  justify  means,  32, 
136—8,  207 — 8  ;  itself  limit- 
less, sets  a  limit  to  the  means, 
15.  51.  7S.  83. 

English  monarchy,  326. 

Ethics,  strict  view  of,  pref.  vi. 
vii.  I,  2. 

Evil,  none  essential  and  positive 
in  human  nature,  170 — i. 

Fear,  as  an  excuse,  30 — i. 
Food  and  fiddling,  when  better 
than  philosophy,  58,  cf.  47,59. 
Fortitude,  94 — 7. 
Francis  of  Assisi,  St.  100 — i. 

General  consequences,  prin- 
ciple of,  178—9,  214 — 5. 

God,  transcends  created  being, 
23 — 4;  object  of  human  happi- 
ness, 24 — 5  ;  God  and  possi- 
bilities, 114;  cannot  but  en- 
force morality,  120 — 2;  how- 
entering  into  Moral  Philo- 
sophy, 123 — 5,  cf.  pref.  vii. 
viii. ;  does  not  dispense  from 
the  natural  law,  149,  150,  273  ; 
punishes  sin,  174 — 6;  twofold 
worship  of,  191 — 6;  God  be- 
yond the  sphere  of  utilities, 
195 — 6;  duty  of  knowing  Him, 
200 — I  ;  why  He  cannot  lie, 
228—9;  no  God,  no  sin,  119, 
125,  364. 

Greek  taste,  81 — 2, 


Grotius  and  Milton,  on  lying, 
230—1. 

Habit,  defined,  64  ;  acquired  by 
acts,  66 — 7  ;  a  living  thing, 
needs  exercise,  67  ;  habit  and 
custom,  67 — 8  ;  man  a  creature 
of  habits,  68 — 9 ;  habits  re- 
main in  the  departed  soul, 
162—3. 

Happiness,  defined,  6 — 12;  open 
to  man,  13 — 20;  final  in  con- 
templation of  God,  21 — 6  ; 
other  than  contentment,  15 ; 
desired  without  limit,  51  —  2; 
not  pleasure,  61. 

Hatred  and  anger,  63 — 4. 

Hedonism,  180 — i. 

Hobbes,    his     Leviathan,     297 — 

307- 

Honour  and  reputation,  251  —  3. 

Horace,  his  phrase,  axirea  mcdio- 
critas,  80. 

Human  act,  i,  27  sq.,  no;  out- 
ward and  inward,  one,  40. 

Humility,  92—3. 

Hypnotism,  199. 

Ignorance,  as  an  excuse,  27 — 9. 

Integrity,  state  of,  49. 

Intellectual  error,  sometimes 
voluntary,  28 ;  in  that  case 
not  mere  intellectual  error, 
75-6.  113- 

Jurisdiction,  differs  from  do- 
minion, 128 — g. 

Justice,  always  relative  to  an- 
other, 102 — 3  ;  legal  (or  gene- 
ral), distributive,  commutative 
(corrective),  103 — 8;  justice 
and  charity  differ,  108. 

Kant,  his  Categorical  Impera- 
tive, 116 — 8. 

Killing,  direct  and  indirect, 
202—8  ;  indirect  in  self-de- 
fence, 208 — 211;  and  in  war, 
352 — 3  ;  direct  only  in  capital 
punishment,  353,  cf.  349,  350. 

Knowledge  of  God,  obligatory, 
200 — I. 


INDEX. 


J77 


Labour,  qualita;ive  as  well  as 
quantitative,  2SS  ;  capital  nut 
simply  an  embodiment  of 
labour,  2S6— 7. 

Land,  a  raw  material,  nationali- 
sation of,  292 — 6. 

Law,  defined.  126—8  ;  the  Eter- 
nal Law,  128—130  ;  irresistible 
and  yet  resisted,  130—2,  174  — 
6  ;  extends  to  all  agents, 
rational  and  irrational,  129 — 
132;  co-eternal  with,  yet  not 
necessary  as  God,  129  ;  laws 
of  physical  nature,  131 — 2  ; 
law  of  conscience,  133  —  5; 
fundamental  laws  of  a  state, 
323 — 4,  362  ;  civil  law,  neces- 
sary complement  of  natural 
law,  359,  360  ;  civil  law,  how 
binding  in  conscience,  360 — i; 
the  King,  Ifgibus  solutus,  how 
far.   361—2 ;    law  and  liberty, 

363   .    ^ 

Lay  mind,  202. 

Liberty,  the  mashes  of  the  net  of 
law,  363  ;  liberty  of  opinion 
and  the  press,  364 — 370. 

Locke,  on   the   state  of  nature, 

309- 
Lying,  definition  of,  224 — 5  ,  in- 
tention to  deceive,  no  part  of 
the  definition,  225  ;  intrinsi- 
cally and  always  wrong,  225— 
231;  why  God  cannot  lie, 
228 — 9  ;  not  against  commu- 
tative justice,  230 —  i:  mental 
reservation  not  in  every  case 
a  lie,  233— 7. 

Magnanimous  man,  98 — loi. 

Magnificence,  97 — 8. 

Marriage,  duty  of  the  race,  not 

of  the  individual,  264—6  ;  two 

goods  of  marriage,  267—270  ; 

unity,  270 — 4  ;  indissolubdiiy, 

274—7. 
Material  and  formal,  33,  225. 
Marx,  Karl,  286. 
Means  to  end,  truly  willed.  32  ; 

four  sorts  of,  36 ;  how  far  and 


how  not  sanctified  by  the  end, 
32,  36 — 8;  distinguished  from 
circumstances,  34,  205—7  '• 
limited   by  the  end,  15,  51,  78. 

Meekness  and  clemency,  93. 

Mental  reservation,  not  in  every 
case  a  lie,  233 — 7. 

Mill,  John,  confounds  self-de- 
fence with  vengeance,  170 — 
213;  his  Utilitarianism,  178 — 
1S8;  on  Liberty,  365 — 6 

Modesty,  93. 

Morality,  meaning  of,  109  sq.  ; 
determinants  of,  31  sij. 

Moral  Philosophy,  definition  and 
division,  pref.  v. — viii.,  i,  2; 
a  progressive  science,  152  ; 
subtlety  of,  20:. 

Moral  Sense,  no  peculiar  faculty 
distinct  from  Intellect,  137 — 
141,  145. 

Money,  ancient  and  modern  use 
of,  259 — 262. 

Nature,  does  nothing  in  vain, 
15 — 8;  living  according  to  na- 
ture. XI 2,  184  ;  laws  of  nature, 
inviolable  as  tendencies,  131  ; 
Slate  of  nature,  308,  310,  310. 

Natural,  in  contrast  with  super- 
natural, 21,  24  :  natural  and 
physical  confounded  by  anci- 
ents, 53  ;  does  not  mean  'com- 
ing natural',  135,  146. 

Natural  law  uf  conscience,  133 — 
S;  mutable  subjectively,  147— 
8 ;  immutable,  situation  re- 
maining unchanged,  148 — 9  ; 
primary  and  secondary  pre- 
cepts, some  of  the  latter  fail 
to  hold  even  objectively,  where 
human  nature  has  sunk  below 
par.  371  —  3.  (notwithstanding 
150 — i) :  not  open  to  dispensa- 
tion, 149,  150,  273. 

Nominalism,  subversion  of  philo- 
sophy, 1 14. 

Obedience,  not  wholly  of  the 
nature  of  a  contract,  305—6. 


378 


INDEX. 


Ought,  or  Obligation,  analysis  of 
the  idea,  pref.  vi.  115  sq.,  140. 

Passion,  as  an  excuse,  29,  30  ; 
definition  of,  41  ;  species  of, 
42 — 3  ;  not  to  be  extirpated, 
43 — 7  ;  never  morally  evil  by 
itself,  47 — 8  ;  passion  and  prin- 
ciple, two  different  sources  of 
sin,  93—4. 

People,  the,  all  government  for, 
129,  321 ;  sovereignty  of,  329, 
330,     339 ;    not     philosophers, 

Person,    autocentric,    as    distin- 
guished from  a  thing  (hetero- 
centric),  204— 5,  349;   to  have 
a  right,  you  must  be  a  person, 
244—5,24  . 
Plato,    on    desires,    53  ;    on    the 
mean  of  virtue,  82  ;  his  simili- 
tude of  the  charioteer,  85 — 6  ; 
his   phrase,    '  set    up   on    holy ' 
pedestal ',  93  ;  fails  to  discover 
justice    in     his    Republic,    102, 
cf.  112;  his  ignoring  of  spiri- j 
tual  sins,  113;  ignores  retribu- ! 
tive  punishment,   176;   object 
of  his  Republic,  188—9. 

Pleasure,  or  delight,  quality  of, 
54 — 8,  180 — I  ;  perfects  acti- 
vity, 56 ;  how  far  wrong  to 
act  or  live  for  pleasure,  59 — 
61  ;  not  happiness,  61,  181. 

Polity,  defined,  312;  variety  of 
polities,  319 — 321  ;  no  one 
polity  best,  universal  and  ex- 
clusive, 325 — 334  ;  elementary 
and  original  polity,  334 — 7  ; 
the  polity  the  standard  of  the 
politically  allowable,  339. 

Polygamy,  271 — 2  ;  patriarchal 
practice,  272 — 3. 

Powers  that  be,  ordained  of  God, 
316—8.  325. 

Private  war,  right  renounced  by 
civilised  man,  309,  351. 

Probable  opinion,  what,  how  a 
lawful  ground  of  action, 
152—8. 


Property,  resfumiliuyis,  278 — 281. 

Prudence,  87 — 9. 

Punishment,  naturally  conse- 
quent upon  sin,  130 — 2,  159, 
160,  1G3  ;  also  a  divine  in- 
fliction, iGi,  174 — 6;  final, 
eternal,  164 — 6  ;  medicinal, 
deterrent,  retributive,  169 — 
176,  308,  350  ;  human  punish- 
ment perhaps  never  purely 
retributive,  174  ;  capital 
punishment,  308,  346 — g  ; 
punishment  a  stimulus  to  con- 
science, 345 — 6  ;  war  not 
punishment,  351 — 3. 

Pyramid  of  capacities,  286. 

Reiffenstuel  on  duelling, 
220 — 2. 

Keligion,  how  connected  with 
morality,  123 — 5  ;  duties  of 
religion,  191 — 5  ;  natural  re- 
ligious power,  357  ;  the  State 
and  religion,  356 — 7,  364. 

Restitution,  when  due,  107 — 8, 
244  ;  not  retribution,  172 — 3. 

Resurrection,  21. 

Revolution,  is  it  ever  right  ? 
340—2. 

Right,  a,  defined,  244 — 6  ;  con- 
natural, acquired,  alienable, 
inalienable,  246  ;  one  man's 
right  imports  another  man's 
duty,  but  not  conversely, 
246 — 7  ;  not  all  rights  conse- 
quences of  duties,  247 — 8  ;  not 
wholly  the  creation  of  the 
State,  299,  300,  350. 

Ritual,  needs  regulation,  197. 

Rousseau,  his  Social  Contract, 
297 — 307  ;  his  inalienable 
sovereignty  of  the  people, 
329.  330,  339- 

Secrets,  232 — 3. 

Self-defence,  differs  from  punish- 
ment and  from  vengeance, 
212,  308 — 9;  a  wrong  maxim 
of  the  jurists,  352 ;  duelling 
not  self-defence,  222. 


INDEX. 


379 


Simulation  and  dissimulation, 
236     7. 

Sin,  material  and  formal,  33 ; 
differs  from  vice,  70  ;  some  by 
mere  passion,  oilier  on  prin- 
ciple, 93 — 4  ;  spiritual  sins, 
113;  philosophical  sin,  119, 
121,  125;  sin  alone  properly 
unnatural,  130 — i  ;  entails 
punishment,  131 — 2,  174—6; 
grave  and  light,  167;  forgive- 
ness of,  an  uncertainty  in 
philosophy,  167  ;  sin  against 
God,  crime  against  the  State, 
172 — 3  ;  atheism  the  abolition 
of  sin,  364. 

Socialism,  Collectivism  and  Syn- 
dicalism, 283 — 291  ;  an  endea- 
vour to  supersede  private 
virtue,  296. 

Soldier's  death,  96. 

Spiritualism,  199,  200. 

State,  individual  not  all  blended 
in,  306 — 7,  355 — 6  ;  definition 
of,3ii;  anatural requisite, more 
than  a  necessity  of  nature, 
313 — 4  ;  involves  authority,  to 
be  obeyed ,  3 1 5 — 6, 36 1 ;  a  perfect 
community,  315  ;  commanded 
and  commissioned  by  God, 
317— S,  325  ;  a  secular  con- 
cern with  a  secular  end,  354 
— 5  ;  the  State  and  virtue, 
355,  cf.  345,  348 ;  State  and 
Church,  356 — 7  ;  State  and 
education,  358 — 9;  doctrines 
dangerous  to  the  State,  364  ; 
State  and  Conscience,  36S — 9  ; 
remotely  a  judge 'of  sin,  but 
does   not   punish    it   as  such, 

350. 
Stoics,  would  extirpate  passion, 

44  ;    their    naturae   convcnienter 

viver:,  112,  1S4;    a  paradox  of 

theirs,  167. 
Suarez,     explains     the     natural 

rise  of  civil  authority,  neglects 

the  historical,  337. 
Suicide,  213 — 9. 
Supernatural,  21 — 4. 


Superstitious  practices,  198 — 9. 
Synderesis,  137,  146. 

Tempekanck,  90 — I. 
Testamentary  right,  2S2. 

Usury,  defined,  257 — 8;  prin- 
ciple upon  which  it  is  wrong, 
256,  258 — 9  ;  commercial  loans 
not  usurious,  gradual  opening 
for  such,  259 — 263. 

Utilitarianism,  177  sq. ;  an  ill- 
concerted  blend  of  Hedonism 
and  Altruism,  180. 

Value,  use  value,  market  value, 
255—6,  283. 

Vice  and  Virtue,  habits,  not 
acts,  69,70;  not  in  children, 
70;   vice  not  sin,  70,  160 — i. 

Virtue,  a  habit,  69,  70;  not  re- 
ducible to  knowledge,  70 — i  ; 
intellectual  and  moral,  70,  73; 
how  moral  and  intellectual 
virtues  differ,  73 — 6  ;  need  of 
moral  virtue,  72,  75—6;  moral 
virtue  (not  theological)  ob- 
serves the  mean,  77 — 84  ;  car- 
dinal virtues,  84 — 7  ;  are  the 
virtues  separable  ?  89,  90 ; 
potential  parts  of  a  virtue,  92  ; 
sense  of  virtue  necessary  to 
national  greatness,  94  ;  virtue 
not  'another  man's  good,'  103, 
188;  how  differing  from  art, 
185 — 6  ;  how  far  the  care  of 
the  State,  355. 

Virtuous  man,  acts  on  motives 
of  virtue,  71,  96 — 7,  184 — 5. 

War,  the  self-defence  of  nations, 
351  ;  not  a  punitive  opera- 
tion, 351 — 2 ;  direct  and  proper 
object,  not  to  kill  but  to  put 
out  of  action,  352 — 3. 

Wild  boy  of  Hanover,  135. 

Worship,  interior  and  exterior, 
reasons  for  the  latter,  191 — 5  ; 
not  as  useful  to  God,  but  be- 
cause He  is  worthy  of  it,  195 
—6. 


STONYHURST   PHILOSOPHICAL    SERIES. 


Extract  from  a  Letter  of  His  Holiness  the  Pope  to  tlic  Bishop  of 
Salford,    on    the    Philosophical   Course    at   Stonyhiirst. 

"  You  will  easily  understand,  Venerable  Brother,  the  pleasure  We  felt  in 
what  you  reported  to  Us  about  the  College  of  Stonyhurst  in  your  diocese, 
namely,  that  by  the  efforts  of  the  Superiors  of  this  College,  an  excellent 
course  of  the  exact  sciences  has  been  successfully  set  on  foot,  by  establishing 
professorships,  and  by  publishing  in  the  vernacular  for  their  students  text- 
books of  Philosophy,  following  the  principles  of  St.  Thomas  Aquinas.  On 
this  work  We  earnestly  congratulate  the  Superiors  and  teachers  of  the 
College,  and  by  letter  We  wish  affectionately  to  express  Our  good-will 
towards  them." 


Moral     Philosophy     (Ethics,      Deontology,     and 

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